Working Principle of Confocal Scanning Microscopes
Abstract
Confocal scanning microscopy, after its invention and patent by M. L. Minsky in the 1950s and later with the novelty of employing lasers as the source, has lent itself to widespread use. By using a spatial pinhole to block the light scattered or reflected from out-of-focus planes, it helps improve the longitudinal resolution and contrast. In this example, we build a confocal scanning microscope in VirtualLab Fusion, and use a metallic grating with alternating ridges and grooves as the test object to demonstrate its working principle.
VirtualLab Fusion Configuration
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VirtualLab Fusion
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Grating Package
Are you interested in further reading?
Tutorial
Modeling of Gratings within Optical System – Discussion at Examples
With the help of typical examples, we explain how to model grating within system and discuss topics like alignment of gratings, grating order selection, and angular response setting.
Use Case
Demonstration of Abbe's Theory of Image Formation
We build up an imaging system, use metal-grid gratings as the test objects, and demonstrate Abbe’s theory on image formation with VirtualLab Fusion.