Phase-Contrast Microscope
-is an optical microscopy technique that converts phase shifts in light passing through a transparent specimen to brightness changes in the image. Phase shifts themselves are invisible, but become visible when shown as brightness variations.
-unpigmented living cells are not clearly visible in the bright field microscope because there is little difference in contrast between the cells and water.
-a type of light microscopy that intensifies contrasts of transparent and colorless objects by influencing the optical path of light.
-it converts slight difference in refractive index and cell density into easily detected variations in light intensity and is an excellent way to observe living cells.
-able to show components in a cell or bacteria, which would be very difficult to see in an ordinary light microscope.
The Phase-Contrast Microscope is a vital instruments in biological and medical research. The phase contrast microscope has made it possible to study living cells, and cell division is an example of a process that has been examined in detail with it.
Phase-Contrast Microscopy is particularly important in biology. It reveals many cellular structures that are not visible with a simpler bright-field microscope, as exemplified in the figure.
After its invention in the early 1930s, phase contrast microscopy proved to be such an advancement in microscopy that its inventor Frits Zernike was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics in 1953.
USES: Microscopic observation of unstained biological material.
INVENTOR: FRITS ZERNIKE
MANUFACTURER: Zeiss, Nikon, Olympus, and others.
Advantages
•Small unstained specimens such as a living cell can be seen.
•It makes highly transparent objects more visible.
•Examining intracellular components of high resolution.
•It made it possible for biologists to study living cells and how they proliferate during cell division.
FRITS ZENIKE (1888-1966)
-was a dutch physicist and winner of the nobel prize for physics in 1953 for his invention of the phase-contrast microscope.
Born: July 16, 1888
Died: March 10, 1966
Nationality: Netherlands
Alma mater: University of Amsterdam
Medal: rumford medal(1952), nobel prize for physics(1953), fellow of the royal society
