A microscope device will help to see transparent objects.

Russian scientists from the I.D. Papanin Institute of Biology of Inland Waters of the Russian Academy of Sciences have patented a device that makes it possible to obtain a clear image of aquatic microorganisms, including translucent and transparent ones. Mikhail Dudakov, inventor and head of the experimental workshop of the IBVV RAS, told Izvestia about this.

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The development is a modified Bogorov chamber, which has been used to study water samples for more than a century. This is a plate with recesses into which an aqueous sample is poured. It does not mix, so the researcher, moving along the recesses, always knows which part of the sample he has already studied.

"This device has its drawbacks. For example, the user usually uses the illumination of the microscope. However, in this case, when the light crosses the boundaries of water, air and the material from which the camera is made, distortions occur. They affect the image quality. To compensate for them, microscope manufacturers use expensive systems, but we went the other way," Dudakov explained.

He said that the essence of the invention is, firstly, that the camera is made of plastic with a refractive index of light close to the aquatic environment. Therefore, an optically homogeneous medium is created between the liquid and the walls of the chamber.

Secondly, special LED arrays are mounted in the walls of the chamber. They direct the light stream, which enters the microscope lens only when interacting with an object. Due to this, the effect is achieved that the observed microorganisms seem to glow from the inside. This gives them a contrasting and clear image against the background of the surrounding dark field.

Read more in the exclusive Izvestia article:

Chamber jungle: transparent organisms will become visible thanks to the new illumination