Microscope super-resolution illumination source

Abstract

An alternative illumination source for traditional optical microscopes is provided. This super-resolution illumination source permits to use a traditional optical microscope for the direct observation of objects smaller than 100 nanometers such as subcellular structures in microorganisms, carbon nanotubes and other nanosize objects, and even nanostructures fabricated on top of a silicon wafer. This invention relies on the integration of two functional elements: a microscope, and the super-resolution illumination source. The super-resolution illumination source is formed by an array of light emitting diodes (LEDs) uniformly distributed in a hemisphere. The object under observation is illuminated by the light emitted in all directions by the array of LEDs. Real, wide-field images of the sample with nano-resolution are direct and analogically formed by the microscope's lenses, without the need of sample tagging, intensive computation or scanning. Depending on the wavelength emission of the LEDs, nano-resolution can be obtained with ultraviolet, infrared, and visible illumination.

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