Several years ago our research program developed a video-rate confocal microscope with no moving parts, based on synchronizing and aligning the scan of an image dissector tube (IDT) with the return light resulting from an acousto-optically scanned laser beam. Improvements on the original system have recently been completed. The laser scan is now brought into the Nikon Diaphot inverted microscope through the epi-illumination port and the laser power has been substantially increased. All beam shaping in the laser scanner is done with prisms instead of cylindrical lenses to reduce aberrations. The IDT is located at the side video output port at the end of a very efficient light path. The new system is described along with some results obtained in the laboratory.
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