walker 0 Posted March 1, 2011 Hi all The worlds most powerful optical microscope Imperial College London was unveiled today in an article in Nature magazine (Nature Communications)it alows us to see things never before seen: 1 March 2011 Last updated at 18:38 Microscope with 50-nanometre resolution demonstrated By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News UK researchers have demonstrated the highest-resolution optical microscope ever - aided by tiny glass beads. The microscope imaged objects down to just 50 billionths of a metre to yield a never-before-seen, direct glimpse into the "nanoscopic" world. The team says the method could even be used to view individual viruses. Their technique, reported in Nature Communications, makes use of "evanescent waves", emitted very near an object and usually lost altogether. Instead, the beads gather the light and re-focus it, channeling it into a standard microscope, allowing researchers to see with their own eyes a level of detail that is normally restricted to indirect methods such as atomic force microscopy or scanning electron microscopy. Using visible light - the kind that we can see - to look at objects of this size is, in a sense, breaking light's rules... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12612209 As always follow the link to original article in full. This optical microscope alows us to see in visible light what we used to have to use a scanning electron microsope to resolve due to the diffraction limit of light. Kind Regards walker Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
johncage 30 Posted March 2, 2011 "to look at objects of this size is, in a sense, breaking light's rules..." lol Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dmarkwick 261 Posted March 2, 2011 (edited) Does the term "light" even make sense at those scales? I thought that's why electron microscopes were invented, as it represents light on a higher wavelenth invisible to our eyes and then shifted down to become images. (Which is why electron microscope images are grey tones only.) Edited March 2, 2011 by DMarkwick Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dm 9 Posted March 2, 2011 "to look at objects of this size is, in a sense, breaking light's rules..."lol :D Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ProfTournesol 956 Posted March 2, 2011 Hi allThe worlds most powerful optical microscope Imperial College London was unveiled today in an article in Nature magazine, it alows us to see things never before seen: Yes, it allows us to see the most OFFTOPIC topic ever seen. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Daniel 0 Posted March 2, 2011 Yes, it allows us to see the most OFFTOPIC topic ever seen. This is an interesting exception. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jakerod 254 Posted March 3, 2011 (edited) Yes, it allows us to see the most OFFTOPIC topic ever seen. OFFTOPIC For discussions not strictly related to our games. Topics should ideally still be related in some way, for example: military, politics, science and other military games. Note that just because this is for offtopic it's not a case of "anything goes", silly topics and especially topics which don't have any scope for discussion will be closed/deleted. Seems to be in the right place. EDIT: At the post below mine; that is why it says ideally. Not to mention is related. Someone could make it into an addon... and yes that can be applied to anything. Edited March 3, 2011 by Jakerod Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ProfTournesol 956 Posted March 3, 2011 Seems to be in the right place. Well my initial intention wasn't to refer to any of the forum rules, but now that you mention it, i fail to see how optical microscope can be "related in some way" to BI games. Anyway, not a big deal on my side. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
hellfire257 3 Posted March 3, 2011 Opticals are okay I guess. Nothing like an Electron micrograph though! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
