Biological observation system

A biological observation system, comprising:

• a light source apparatus configured to, as illuminating light for illuminating an object, supply a first red light having a wavelength band belonging to a red region and light having a wavelength band belonging to a region other than the red region as a first illuminating light, and supply a second red light having a wavelength band belonging to the red region and having an absorption coefficient for blood that is lower than an absorption coefficient for blood of the first red light, and light having a wavelength band belonging to a region other than the red region as a second illuminating light, and to supply the first illuminating light and the second illuminating light at mutually different timings while switching between the first illuminating light and the second illuminating light;
• an image pickup device in which is provided a plurality of pixels having spectral sensitivities such that a sensitivity to any one color among a predetermined plurality of colors is relatively higher than a sensitivity to other colors than the one color, and which is configured to receive light from an object and generate an image pickup signal for each of the plurality of pixels;
• a color separation processing portion configured to perform color separation processing for separating, from an image pickup signal of respective color components generated by the image pickup device, an image pickup signal corresponding to a color component obtained when an image of light of a predetermined wavelength band included in light from the object is picked up by a pixel having a greatest sensitivity to the light of the predetermined wavelength band among the plurality of pixels;
• and
• a control portion configured to, in a case where an image pickup signal that is inputted to the color separation processing portion is an image pickup signal corresponding to the first illuminating light, control the color separation processing portion so as to perform a first color separation processing that separates the image pickup signal into a signal corresponding to the first red light and a signal corresponding to light belonging to a region other than the red region, and in a case where an image pickup signal that is further inputted to the color separation processing portion is an image pickup signal corresponding to the second illuminating light, control the color separation processing portion so as to switch to a second color separation processing that separates the image pickup signal into a signal corresponding to the second red light and a signal corresponding to light belonging to a region other than the red region.