Science Lab

Learn. Share. Contribute. The knowledge portal of Leica Microsystems. Find scientific research and teaching material on the subject of microscopy. The portal supports beginners, experienced practitioners and scientists alike in their everyday work and experiments. Explore interactive tutorials and application notes, discover the basics of microscopy as well as high-end technologies. Become part of the Science Lab community and share your expertise.

Collecting Light: The Importance of Numerical Aperture in Microscopy

Numerical aperture (abbreviated as ‘NA’) is an important consideration when trying to distinguish detail in a specimen viewed down the microscope. NA is a number without units and is related to the…

Interview with Dr. Shigeki Watanabe on Research in Synaptic Membrane Dynamics

Dr. Shigeki Watanabe, principle investigator of the department of Cell Biology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, held a workshop in Zürich, Switzerland on methods to…

„Confetti-Mouse“, taken with the 4Tune spectral detector of Leica’s Deep in-vivo Explorer SP8 DIVE.

Laser Beam Shaping for Multicolor Multiphoton Microscopy

Multiphoton Microscopy is one of the current hot topics in life science research. The new Leica TCS SP8 DIVE from Leica Microsystems presents a series of beneficial new innovations, including a freely…

Introduction to Widefield Microscopy

This article gives an introduction to widefield microscopy, one of the most basic and commonly used microscopy techniques. It also shows the basic differences between widefield and confocal…

Optimization of the Interplay of Optical Components for Aberration Free Microscopy

Optical microscopes are used to magnify objects which are otherwise invisible for the human eye. For this purpose high quality optics is necessary to achieve appropriate resolution. However, besides…

Primary Beam Splitting Devices for Confocal Microscopes

Current fluorescence microscopy employs incident illumination which requires separation of illumination and emission light. The classical device performing this separation is a color-dependent beam…

Photoactivatable, Photoconvertible, and Photoswitchable Fluorescent Proteins

Fluorescent proteins (FPs) such as GFP, YFP or DsRed are powerful tools to visualize cellular components in living cells. Nevertheless, there are circumstances when classical FPs reach their limits.…

Pinhole diameter and diffraction pattern.

Pinhole Effect in Confocal Microscopes

When operating a confocal microscope, or when discussing features and parameters of such a device, we inescapably mention the pinhole and its diameter. This short introductory document is meant to…

Comparison when observing a rodent model organism with a Greenough versus CMO (common main objective) stereo microscope for a task like surgery.

Rodent and Small-Animal Surgery

Learn how you can perform rodent (mouse, rat, hamster) and small-animal surgery efficiently with a microscope for developmental biology and medical research applications by reading this article.