Patent ID: 7564624

Claim:
A microscope comprising: at least a first laser and a second laser, the first laser being coupled to a first light-guiding fiber and the second laser being coupled to a second light-guiding fiber; an output fiber disposed in an illumination beam path; an attenuator disposed on the output fiber; a microscope objective disposed in the illumination beam path; and a fiber multiplexer disposed in the illumination beam path and coupled to the output fiber, to the first light guiding fiber, and to the second light-guiding fiber, the fiber multiplexer receiving the light emitted by the first laser and coupled to the first light guiding fiber and the light emitted from the second laser and coupled to the second light guiding fiber, the fiber multiplexer selectively passing the light from the first laser or the light from the second laser onto the illumination beam path toward the microscope objective, wherein the microscope is a scanning microscope, wherein the selection by the fiber multiplexer is in response to positional signals from a scanning beam deflector, and wherein the fiber multiplexer can be switched synchronously for pixel-by-pixel scanning of a scan field.