Patent ID: 8289620

Claim:
An apparatus by which light emitted from a specimen is imaged by an image capture device to produce a video signal for creating an image in a display device or for processing and analysis, comprising: means for mounting the specimen, a light source for producing excitation light, a confocal scanning system adapted to direct excitation light in one direction towards, and thereby to scan, an area of the specimen and also adapted to convey light emitted from the specimen as a consequence of the excitation light incident thereon, in another direction, which operates in use to scan typically repeatedly an area of interest of the specimen, an image capture device having discrete spatially distinct light sensitive regions on which light emitted from the specimen is focussed to form an image after being conveyed through the scanning system in said other direction, and control means comprising a host computer and a controller, the controller being programmed to function as a state machine, with the host computer arranged to supply state data to the state machine controller, the state machine controller having a state counter, a state memory and a duration downcounter which receives a clock signal and being adapted to control the scanning system, the excitation light source and the image capture device so that, for each image to be formed at the image capture device, light from the specimen is only incident on the image capture device for a specific time period equal to that required by the scanning system to scan the area of interest n times where n is a whole number equal to or greater than 1.