Patent ID: 6995901

Claim:
An optical system comprising: an illumination source producing an illumination beam; a sample holding stage for holding a sample onto which the illumination beam is directed; a first objective lens; a second objective lens; an objective lens mount onto which said first objective lens and said second objective lens are mounted, said mount allowing selective positioning one of said first objective lens and said second objective lens in a position to collect light from the sample and transmit collected light in a collected light beam; a first imaging lens; a second imaging lens; an imaging lens mount onto which said first imaging lens and said second imaging lens are mounted, said mount allowing a user to selectively position one of said first imaging lens or said second imaging lens in a collected light beam path, wherein any selected objective lens and imaging lens combination become a selected lens pair, wherein any selected lens pair is optically symmetrical; an area array detector, wherein light passing through said first or second imaging lens impinges on said area array detector; and an imaging filter positioned between in the path of the collected light beam at a region of parallel light rays.