Spherical and chromatic aberrations have been the bane of optical lenses ever since they were first ground from a piece of glass. As light travels through a convex (converging) lens, the rays at the center of the optical axis are refracted (bent) less than the peripheral rays, so that the central rays are focused behind the peripheral rays. This is the essence of spherical aberration. Light of differing wavelengths (colors) interact differently with the lens so that longer wavelengths (red) are focused behind shorter wavelengths (blue). This is chromatic aberration. In the early days of light microscopy, these two inherent flaws seriously limited the quality of images.