A NEW CONFOCAL SCANNING BEAM LASER MACROSCOPE USING A TELECENTRIC, F-THETA LASER SCAN LENS

摘要

A new confocal scanning beam system (MACROscope) that images very large-area specimens is described. The MACROscope uses a telecentric, f-theta laser scan lens as an objective lens to image specimens as large as 7.5cm x 7.5cm in 5s. The lateral resolution of the MACROscope is 5 mu m and the axial resolution is 200 mu m. When combined with a confocal microscope, a new hybrid imaging system is produced that uses the advantages of small-area, high-speed, high-resolution microscopy (0.2 mu m lateral and 0.4 mu m axial resolution) with the large-area, high-speed, good-resolution imaging of the MACROscope, The advantages of the microscope/MACROscope are illustrated in applications which include reflected-light confocal images of biological specimens, DNA sequencing gels, latent fingerprints and photoluminescence imaging of porous silicon. [References: 10]