Patent ID: 6995903
Filing Date: 2006-02-07
Classification: G02B

Abstract:
1. A transmission microscope, comprising: a polychromatic light source, the light source being a non-oscillating and non-vibrating source of polychromatic light; an objective lens for viewing a subject; an optical path connecting the light source, via the subject to be viewed, to the objective lens, the optical path being free of filters; a first non-oscillating and non-vibrating diffraction grating located in the optical path between the light source and the subject; an adjustable aperture, with an adjustable aperture size, following the first grating; a second non-oscillating and non-vibrating diffraction grating following the aperture downstream of the first grating and upstream of the subject in the optical path; tilting means for tilting a plane of the first diffraction grating relative to a line of light in the optical path, wherein, the first grating diffracts light, from the light source, incident on the first diffraction grating into a plurality of overlapping spectra, the tilting means is operable to select a set of frequencies from the overlapping spectra and direct the selected set of frequencies along the optical path to the subject, the adjustable aperture is operable to further select a subset of the selected set of frequencies to illuminate the subject by adjusting the aperture size, a plane of the second grating is generally normal to the optical path, and the subject is illuminated with any one of a plurality of combinations of frequencies having predetermined fixed intensities relative to one another, as defined by selecting different subsets of the selected set of frequencies by repeated adjustment of the aperture size.