PACINI MONOCULAR COMPOUND MICROSCOPE Filippo Pacini was an Italian instrument maker who excelled in microscope design and construction during the mid nineteenth century. The microscope illustrated below is an example of the microscopes produced by Pacini. An original version of the microscope was photographed and described by Gerard Turner in his book Catalogue of Microscopes. […]

Andrew Ross Monocular Compound Microscope Andrew Ross was a skilled English optician who crafted the monocular compound microscope sometime between 1841 and 1842. The illustration of the instrument provided was drawn from photographs of the original microscope, which was described by Gerard Turner in The Great Age of the Microscope. A compass joint with a […]

MONOCULAR COMPOUND MICROSCOPE This simple monocular compound microscope, whose maker is unknown, was produced sometime around 1860. The model featured below was redrawn from photographs of the original microscope, which is part of the Billings microscope collection at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington DC. The turned wooden base is approximately two and a […]

The nineteenth century witnessed vast improvements in microscope design and function. Objectives and condensers were being built with multiple lenses that had increasing degrees of optical correction. Photomicrography made its debut in mid-century and by the end of the nineteenth century, high-end microscopes performed better than many student models produced today. The first part of […]

INTRODUCTION TO MICROSCOPY Microscopes are instruments designed to produce magnified visual or photographic images of objects too small to be seen with the naked eye. The microscope must accomplish three tasks: produce a magnified image of the specimen, separate the details in the image, and render the details visible to the human eye or camera. […]