Microscopes

• Using an optical microscope


  1. Place slide onto the stage

  2. Select lowest power objective lens (usually 4x)

  3. Position the objective lens so it almost touches the objective lens

  4. Look through the eyepiece and slowly turn coarse focusing dial until cells come into focus

  5. Use fine focusing dial to bring the cells into a clear focus
• Magnification

  • Magnification of eyepiece lens
  • Magnification of objective lens
• What we can see with an optical microscope

  • Cell membrane, cytoplasm, nucleus (animal)
  • Cell wall, cytoplasm, nucleus, chloroplasts, vacuole (plant)
  • Cannot see ribosomes (animal)