Light microscope
AssigneeLeica Microsystems CMS GmbH
InventorFlorian Fahrbach
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A light microscope includes a scan illumination unit, which is designed to illuminate a specimen having a line focus produced by an illumination light beam and moved transversely to a light propagation direction. A descanned detection unit is designed to produce a stationary first line image of a target region from detection light that originates from a target region of the specimen illuminated with the moving line focus. The scan illumination unit and the descanned detection unit have a common objective, which is designed to receive both the illumination light beam and the detection light. The descanned detection unit contains a dispersive element, which is designed to spectrally split the detection light in order to generate multiple second line images, corresponding to the first line image, with different spectral compositions.
Claims20
A light microscope, comprising:
- a scan illumination unit, which is designed to illuminate a specimen volume with a line focus produced by an illumination light beam to propagate through the specimen and moved transversely to a light propagation direction;
- and
- a descanned detection unit, which is designed to produce a stationary first line image of points in the specimen lying along the light propagation direction from detection light that originates from a target region within the specimen illuminated with the moving line focus,
- wherein the scan illumination unit and the descanned detection unit have a common objective, which is designed to receive both the illumination light beam and the detection light, and
- wherein the descanned detection unit contains a dispersive element, which is designed to spectrally split the detection light in a direction orthogonal to the first line image in order to generate multiple second line images, corresponding to the first line image, that contain different spectral information from each other.
A method for light-microscopic imaging of a specimen, the method comprising:
- illuminating a volume of the specimen by a scan illumination unit with a line focus produced by an illumination light beam to propagate through the specimen and moved transversely or perpendicular to a light propagation direction;
- producing, by a descanned detection unit, a stationary first line image of points in the specimen lying along the light propagation direction from detection light that originates from a target region within the specimen illuminated with the moving line focus;
- receiving, by a common objective used for the scan illumination unit and the descanned detection unit, the illumination light beam and the detection light;
- and
- spectrally splitting, by a dispersive element contained within the descanned detection unit, the detection light in a direction orthogonal to the first line image so as to produce multiple second line images, corresponding to the first line image, that contain different spectral information from each other.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.