Adobe Photoshop may not come to mind as a program that is useful for segmenting (separating regions of interest from other visual information), but, in many ways, its functions can help scientists gain several end results. These include the ability to fully or partially automate the segmentation of entire directories of image files, the ability to better separate regions of interest from background, and the ability to narrow histograms (making the selection of a grayscale value less subjective when setting a threshold value).

Microscopists and scientific photographers sometimes find it desirable or necessary to record a larger field size than the lowest power objective can cover using brightfield illumination. This applies to the largest thin sections examined by biologists and geologists in transmitted light and the opaque, planar specimens examined by the materials scientist in reflected light. These needs were once well met by Leitz with their Panphot and Aristophot systems and to a lesser extent by Zeiss with their Ultraphot II.

The contrast range of many digital images needs to be reset before outputting images to various ends. This is especially important when printing to paper because ink absorbs into papers through a capillary action, most in the cheapest papers (such as newspaper) and least in high gloss paper from slick magazines. The capillary phenomenon is known as dot gain In the printing world, since images are redefined as small dots when printing to publications, The result of dot gain is seen most in a loss of details or muddiness in the shadow or the black region of images.

The method for creating pseudocolor in Photoshop can be done in few steps, but the image will not be colored in the conventional way. The conventional means for producing pseudocolor comes by using a look up table (LUT). This LUT is an overlay for making a range of colors according to choices provided by the software. The colors are matched to levels of brightness and darkness in the image (grayscale pixel values), typically from a short to long wavelengths. In that scenario, violet colors are matched to the black and near-black pixels and red to those dose to absolute white. Blue, yellow, green and orange become the mid-range pixel values.

My first universal student microscope, shown in Figure 1, began life as a Monolux microscope from the 1960rs. Its development into a universal student microscope began when my wife wanted a polarized light microscope with the ability to photograph microscopic crystals under a cover glass for their artistic value. My background as a metallurgist was with the reflected light metallurgical microscope, I have also designed and built vertical illuminators for brightfield illumination of complete metal log raphic specimens using a fiber optic light guide end as the light source with lens configurations giving an imaged field diaphragm and an illumination aperture diaphragm imaged in the aperture of the macro lens.

LEO's field emission scanning electron microscopes are all based an the “GEMINI” principle as shown in figure 1. In order to reduce aberrations and sensitivity to interfering stray-fields the electron optical column possesses a positively biased booster that shifts the energy of the primary electrons. The incident beam is focussed by a combination of a magnetic lens with an axial gap that avoids field leakage to the specimen and an electrostatic retarding lens formed by the beam booster together with the grounded pole piece cap. Shortly before the electrons hit the specimen they are decelerated down to the desired primary energy.

Images produced by an atomic forces microscope (AFM) often contain spurious features and image distortion that can render accurate imaging and metrology suspect. These “artifacts” are caused by the manner in which the image is produced. Artifacts can originate from the probe tip geometry, scanner non-linearity, image processing software, vibration, sample contamination, electronic noise, and poor sample stability. This article describes and illustrates common AFM image artifacts and suggests means to eliminate or minimize them.

TEM sample preparation using Focused Ion Beam (FIB) methods becomes more and more interesting for microscopists because the technique allows for reliable and very efficient sample preparation. The first application of TEM sample preparation by FIB-cutting was reported more than 10 years ago. Meanwhile, a lot of experience has been gathered that allows one to discuss the capabilities and limits of the FIB technique in detail.

Several TEM sample preparation techniques are known that all include FIB-cutting but differ in sample pre-preparation, sample handling, etc. This paper focuses on the actual FIB process, FIB tools are closely related to Scanning Electron Microscopes, but instead of an electron beam an ion beam (mostly Ga+ ions) is used to remove and deposit material.

Combinatorial and high-throughput (C&HT) approaches accelerate research by addressing multiple experimental parameters in a parallel or otherwise highly efficient fashion. First used by the pharmaceutical industry for product discovery, the C&HT paradigm is being extended to the study of complex materials systems that require measurements of properties and phenomena over a huge number of conditions. As with traditional materials science, microscopy and imaging of morphology are essential for C&HT materials research.

The ability to immunologically link microscopic tags to specific proteins has produced major advances in all forms of microscopy. Initially researchers needed to make and label their own antibodies. This required a good working knowledge of immunology. Today's labeled antibodies are readily available from a variety of vendors. Although this has greatly facilitated the expansion of immunolabeling techniques, it has also led to their use by researchers with little or no background in immunology.

Confocal microscopes have come a long way in the past decade. Not only are they more stable and easier to use than ever before, but their cost has dropped enough that multi-user facilities are finding competition from individual labs using the new breed of "personal" confocals. In fact it has, in some cases, become the de facto standard for fluorescence imaging regardless of whether the user actually has requirements for it or not.

But, researchers always have an ear out for something better. Enter 2-photon microscopy (2PLSM). The “bigger & badder” cousin of the confocal microscope has become a new weapon in the arsenal of a microscopy industry that caters to researchers who can't wait to fill their labs with the latest and greatest imaging systems. Advertised by the industry and researchers alike as a technique that seems to solve most of the problems that plague confocal, “2-photon” has become the new buzzword in the vocabulary of researchers eager to enhance their fluorescence applications.

The terrorist attack and collapse of two towers of the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York City on September 11, 2001 generated tremendous clouds of dust that settled over a wide area. Concern over the potential health effects of breathing this dust made it imperative that the WTC dust be characterized as completely as possible. As part of this characterization, a microscopical examination using several types of microscopes provided key data on the components of the dust. The WTC dust sample that is the primary focus of this report was collected by F.C. Ewing from an outdoor window ledge at 33 Maiden Lane, New York City, NY on October 7, 2001.

Does quality exist in the electron microscope laboratory? What is quality? Quality is when a product or service meets all of the customers' requirements, is delivered in the correct quantity at the required time, to the right place and at a price the customer is prepared to pay.

In an open competitive environment all of the above would apply. In an electron microscope laboratory are we totally satisfied that we have given consideration to our product? We also provide a service, are we happy that the service we provide is of a sufficiently high standard, a standard that we would expect if we were the customers in a hotel or a garage? If we follow the example of world trends in industry, then simple product and service quality, in isolation, fs no longer sufficient, and focus must be given to a total quality approach.

All of us who work with images understand the enormous amount of time post-processing can require. Before you know it, a few hours can easily slip by even for the most seasoned among us. When so many other things need to be done, it can be frustrating to spend hours on image preparation.

Fortunately, some more frequent steps taken in Photoshop can be automated, and these can be assigned to one of the Function keys (F keys) at the top of the keyboard, or a droplet can be made (Photoshop 6x & 7x only).

Cross-section transmission electron microscope (TEM) specimen preparation of Ill-V materials using conventional methods can be a painful and time-consuming activity, with a day or more from receipt of a sample to examination in the TEM being the norm. This article describes the cross-section TEM specimen preparation technique used at Bookham Caswell. The usual time from start to finish is <1 hour. Up to 10 samples can be prepared at once, depending upon sample type. Most of the tools used are widely available and inexpensive, making the technique ideal for use in institutions with limited resources.

As it is in traditional materials science, microscopy is a central tool for morphology characterization in combinatorial and high-throughput (C&HT) materials research. Indeed, micrographs are naturally amenable to C&HT studies, since they enable rapid visual screening and automated quantitative analysis by a plethora of well-tested image processing routines. In this article, we present a custom-built and cost-effective automated optical microscopy (AOM) platform designed for the C&HT analysis of gradient specimens. Gradient specimens progressively vary one or more parameters with position, presenting a multitude of experimental conditions within a single sample (see Part 1 of this series).

The introduction of the environmental scanning electron microscope (ESEM) greatly Improved the functionality of scanning electron microscope (SEM) technology by allowing objects to be imaged in water-vapor under low vacuum, and without the need for coating to facilitate electrical conductivity. The low vacuum environment allows Imaging of delicate structures, such as needlelike crystals, without fear of damaging the object in the process of viewing it.

Soil structure influences water supply to plant roots, aeration, water infiltration rates, suitability of soil medium for seed germination and growth, growth of plant roots, drainage, evaporation, mechanical strength, and workability (Dexter 1988). Adequate description of soil structure for cultivation, engineering, or remediation is typically done by light microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. Literature exists in numerous sources for preparation of soils for microscopy, but often preparation steps are left out due to the shortening of Methods Sections in journal articles to conserve print space. I present here, protocols I've used for preparation of tropical soils (Oxisols) for microscopy.

Ancient forests comprised an enormous biomass and typically flourished in lowland habitats that offered favorable conditions for fossllization, so it is not surprising that petrified wood is the most abundant terrestrial fossil. Petrifaction of wood by carbonates, sulfides, oxides, and phosphates is evidence that fossilization can occur under diverse geochemical conditions, but silicification is by far the most common process.

Teaching and training users how to operate laboratory equipment is a time-intensive practice. Many new users are students, who have generally high turnover rates; after they complete a class project or degree program, they leave the facility, In addition, users often divide their time among a variety of techniques and equipment. With episodic usage, researchers tend to forget details of instrument operation and need to be retrained. Academic core facilities must balance their productivity against the time it takes to train and retrain an ever-changing parade of users. Site-specific multimedia teaching and training resources, such as films, CDs, videos, or DVDs, if easily available in the laboratory, would enable users to refresh and retrain themselves on equipment operation.