Abstract

Biological measurement and examination with a microscope has become important method for spectral analysis¹⁾ and microsurgery²⁾ of cellular materials and micro-organisms in biomedicine and lifescience. By a conventional fluorescence microscope system, however, it is difficult to perform the measurement of weak fluorescence from low fluorescent molecules contained in a single cell or organelle, even in living situations, because of the low excitation efficiency and poor sensitivity. To overcome these problems, we have designed and developed an advanced type of digitized fluorescence microscope system using a laser for high radiant and narrowband excitation, and an ultra-high sensitivity image sensor for quantitative measurement of the spatial distribution of fluorescence intensity across a cell based on the digital image processing technique³⁾. In this paper, we report the system configuration and some new results obtained for cultured single biological cells for the first time.

© 1988 Optical Society of America