Core Doucments

• Micscape the premier on-line publication for amateur microscopy.
  The main site is www.microscopy-uk.org.uk and is mirrored at www.microscopy-uk.net.
  As of January 4, 2006 the main site was being moved to a new server and some problems can be expected while 10 years worth of data is moved to a new and better home. If you have problems notify the editor Dave Walker and try the mirror site. I have found some broken links as of January 15, 2006. Dave and Maurice Smith have been hard at work on this labor of love for the past ten years. Please bear with them though this change as they are, in my opinion, one of the top two resources for amateur microscopy.

• The other of the two resources is Michael W. Davidson's Molecular Expressions he does at Florida State University. This has to be the best site for optical microscopy I have seen by a very large lead and at the rate it is growing is great.

• 'Collecting and Preserving Insects and Mites' : Techniques and Tools  (69 pages)
  Edited by M. E. Schauff - Systematic Entomology Laboratory, USDA, National Museum of Natural History, NHB 168 Washington, D.C. 20560.
  This USDA paper covers almost everything about collection and mounting insects. Mounting them for viewing under a microscope starts on page 39. My first practical use of a microscope was when I was 10 using my Gilbert to help my Dad and the county extension agent decide what species of aphid was in the wheat on the farm in the 1950's. A new aphid or green bug was infesting the wheat that required spraying at much lower numbers than the ones we were used to. In the 50 some years I have observed green bugs in wheat it is amazing the adaptions they make year to year. The interplay of number of acres planted in an area, the variety of wheat, level of grazing and the past insecticide use gives an almost infinite response from the green bug population.

• In going through and highlighting the names of the people associated with these Links, I was unable to find a person's name for the Micrographia website. It is obvious that the work is being done by a very accomplished microscopist. He must have a reason for not signing his name. I even recognized an image that had been used in a Micsape article and thought for sure I would find his name there - but it was attributed to Micrographia.
  Regardless, the site is one of the best sources of information on electronic flash, his work on photomacrography and photomicrography of mosquitoes is stunning, and he shows how he repairs and improves vinyl records. Using 1mm fiber optic strands for oblique reflected lighting is unique.

• The McCrone Group has a new on-line publication Modern Microscopy along with their Modern Microscopy Journal. This Journal has no subscription date and thus no lead time on publication - the piece is published when it is ready. I hope more of this is the future of publishing. This Journal also has a How To Tutorial section. Their Particle Atlas is one of the biggest steps for on-line microscopy publishing yet. They also have McCrone Microscope & Accessories on-line and they are an inexpensive source of top quality polarizing film, 1/4, 1/2 and full wave film as well as a wide array of specialty items and regular lab supplies.

• Mike Andre points out "I would expect the Victorian and custom slides to be hard to equal from a quality standpoint. Many of those slides actually define 'quality' and finding equal quality on a commercial level probably won't happen." However, check out MingZhu Industries for a wide range of prepared slides. The Director is Mr. Wang Wei and he is reasonably responsive and will work with you.

• 'Microscopy from the Very Beginning'   (48 pages)   by Carl Zeiss is a brief overview of the history of microscopes, with the emphasis on Zeiss and the people that made it all happen. This document has cut away drawings of modern Zeiss scopes and a description of how they work. While it is not as extensive as the work done through the long term effort of Molecular Expressions, the concise descriptions have a great deal of information and are helpful in understanding what is going on in a microscope when used alone or with other resources. Zeiss has a good deal of their documentation on line. It has been a moving target, but here are some Instruction Manuals for high end microscopes.

• Mikroskop Online hosts scanned documentation (in German) for Zeiss aus Jenna & aus Jenna microscopes. They also have a nice Microscope Museum.
  Alta Vista's Babble Fish or Google's translation tools will help non-German readers through the pages. However, the documents have not be OCRed into text so they are difficult for those of us that don't read German to use. Over 100 years ago my grandfather was studying to be an organic chemist and minoring in German, but now we let students use a computer language for their foreign language requirement.

• I would like to see a write-up on the structure of the Abbe Trust that has forged a bond between the workers of Zeiss and the company that allowed them to suffer through two World Wars and being ripped to pieces in the second war. All three survived in the marketplace that decimated most microscope manufacturers. I realize Zeiss aus Jenna and Lomo had state support and Carl Zeiss West incorporated the aus Jena workers with the reunification of Germany. But Carl Zeiss is the only Western maker of microscopes that hasn't gone through extensive reorganization in the last 30 years.

• The text only Mineralogical Record. It would be great if it had some images and not so many adds and pop ups, but the price is hard to beat. It is good to see more and more publications available to the public as open access in any form.

• The New Photomicrography   (10 pages) paper by Peter Evennett that sparked the Nikon CoolPix's popularity on microscopes.