Confocal Basics (2)
Advantages of confocal microscopes 1 | 2
Confocal Microscopes
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Major improvements offered by a confocal microscope over the performance of a conventional microscope may be summarized as follows:
1. Light rays from outside the focal plane will not be recorded.
2. Defocussing does not create blurring, but gradually cuts out parts of the object as they move away from the focal plane. Thus, these parts become darker and eventually disappear. This feature is called optical sectioning.
3. True, three-dimensional data sets can be recorded.
1. Light rays from outside the focal plane will not be recorded.
2. Defocussing does not create blurring, but gradually cuts out parts of the object as they move away from the focal plane. Thus, these parts become darker and eventually disappear. This feature is called optical sectioning.
3. True, three-dimensional data sets can be recorded.
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4. Scanning the object in x/y-direction as well as in z-direction (along the optical axis) allows viewing the objects from all sides.
5. Due to the small dimension of the illuminating light spot in the focal plane, stray light is minimized.
6. By image processing, many slices can be superimposed, giving an extended focus image which can only be achived in conventional microscopy by reduction of the aperture and thus sacrificing resolution
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