Microscope with 50-nanometre resolution demonstrated

Researchers in the UK have created the highest-resolution optical microscope, capable of imaging objects down to 50nm!  The microscope is filled with tiny glass beads and takes “evanescent waves” that are emitted and lost very close to an objects and refocuses them.  This allows for insanely high optical resolutions.

The microscopes give people the ability to see what used to only be possible with atomic force and scanning electron microscopy.   The diffraction limit of visible light allows only resolutions to about 200nm, but the evanescent waves referred to in the article are not subject to that limit.  This means that incredibly small objects can be seen optically.

The tiny beads inside are called microspheres, and being only millionths of a meter in diameter, they are placed on the surfaces of a sample.  These beads then collect light being emitted and focus it so a standard microscope can pick them up.  As proof of its resolution, the team that invented it used it to view the nanometer-sized grooves on a Blu-Ray disc, among other things.  The coolest thing, though, is that the team expects to use it to view “cells, bacteria, and even viruses.”

I found this article to be interesting because when discussing things that are taking place at the microscopic level, I always wonder what we are talking about looks like.  The fact that a technique has been created to view things at that kind of resolution excited me because in a sense it is like looking into a whole other world that has thus far been hidden from our eyes.  The key to a potential wealth of knowledge that could benefit all of medicine may have just been discovered.  That’s just cool.

Article Link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12612209