A Motic tablet camera seen from a different perspective

If you would like to take a closer look at the screen of your tablet - in this case it is a Motic tablet-camera combination - then you could very well use a microscope. 

The screen of the tablet was observed through the Motic stereomicroscope SMZ171 for the moving images. The Motic BA410E was used with a LM Plan 10X objective for the still images.

The camera used to record the color switching of the pixels was the Moticam 1080 and the still images were taken with a Moticam 10 camera. You can see the typical pixel shape, which is different from the one you can see on e.g. mobile phones. Red, green and blue are the basic colors used. Each pixel can switch to only one of these colors, but combinations thereof will form a complete color spectrum.

Pigment protects

The skin is the largest organ of the human body. The skin consists of three layers. The top layer is formed by the epidermis. The middle layer is called the dermis. The bottom layer is the subcutaneous connective tissue. The epidermis consists mainly of special skin cells called the keratinocytes. The keratinocytes are formed in the lower layer (the basal layer) and slowly slide upwards from there. Gradually they transfer to a dead keratinized cell layer, the horny layer, where the cells lie loosely against each other.

Melanocytes are present in the epidermis, in addition to the keratinocytes. Melanocytes are pigment cells that lie between the cells of the basal cell layer and make the pigment grains that are transferred via offshoots to the keratinocytes. The pigment of the pigment granules, the melanin, determines to a large extent the color of the skin and protects us from sunlight. The more pigment grains, the darker the skin. Pigment is a brown dye that is produced by the pigment cells in the lower layer of the epidermis. Pigment cells lay therefore relatively superficial in the skin. In the pigment cell, the pigment is packaged in pigment granules, and thus delivered to the upper epidermal cells. Only when the pigment is in the epidermal cells the skin is visibly pigmented.

The functions of pigment cells are besides determining the skin color also protecting the skin against harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays. Under the influence of UV radiation, the number of active pigment cells and pigment production increases. The result is a brown discoloration of the skin.

With thanks to Dr. Eddie Wisse and Frank van Campen, members of the Royal Antwerp Society for Micrography.
Prepared slide by Lieder www.lieder.com

© www.willemsmicroscope.com

Snails: Powerhouses

Snails are the only mollusks that can live on land. As many as 60,000 to 75,000 species are known in the world. Snails are also called gastropods. This is because the muscles on the abdomen (bottom of the snail) are responsible for the movement. Most snails are hermaphrodite, which means that they have both male and female sexual organs. Some snails are even solitary and can reproduce without needing another snail!

Believe it or not, but a snail has more teeth than a shark! A snail can have more than 25,000 teeth and sharks "only" have 3,000. The snail hides all these small teeth on its tongue (radula)_ and scrapes small pieces off the leaves that it eats. Ever wondered why there are so many holes in the leaves of your plants? A snail can eat up to half its own body weight in one day! It does not matter much what snails eat. They prefer to eat only the soft part of the plant, but when there is a long drought, they can take a bite from your newspaper if they can't find anything else. They are not picky.

© www.willemsmicroscope.com

Artery from another perspective

The preparation of the artery shown in both images is of unknown origin and the staining method is unknown as well.

A fluorescence image of an artery tissue as shown here is not usual. The preparation is more or less evenly green fluorescent colored, because the dye used has attached itself to the structural parts of the preparation. We see a fluorescence color image with details as you might encounter in bright field microscopy with dyes such as e.g. toluidine blue. Such dyes show more or less the same details in the preparation with ordinary bright field microscopy as is shown in the first image.

As mentioned before, visualizing a histological specimen completely by using a fluorescent substance is unusual, because here you apply only one color that shows no specific adhesion, except for proteins, because e.g. fat is uncolored in this preparation. With a normal hematoxylin and eosin staining you have more differentiation, namely in the cell core (DNA, dark blue) and proteins, cytoplasm (pink)

In histology, fluorescence is mainly used after a fluorescent substance has been chemically attached to a specific component present in the tissue.

On the fluorescent image of the preparation the parts of an artery can also be seen. The lumen is filled with green colored red blood cells, then there is a very thin (barely visible) layer of endothelium, the meandering lamina elastica interna (clearly visible) a layer of smooth muscle, the thinner lamina elastica externa (clearly visible), the adventitia (connective  tissue) that turns into adipose (fat) tissue. 

© www.willemsmicroscope.com