The earliest microscope was no
more than a single small lens that magnified between 6 and 10 times. Sacharias Jensen and his father, Hans, a lens
maker, experimented with combinations of lenses and realized that greater
magnification could be obtained by an inversion of the telecope. Their compound microscope combined a
magnifying objective lens (the one closest to the object being investigated)
with an eye lens at the opposite end of a tube.
A focusing device was added by the Italian Gallileo Galilei.
The circulation of blood through
capillaries was observed by the Italian physiologist Marcello Malpighi
(1624-1694). The popularity of
microscopes was greatly enhanced by the publication of Micrographia (1655) by
English scientist Robert Hooke. The
Dutchman Anthoni van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) used a microscope to count the
number of threads in woven cloth, and his refined instrument could magnify 270
times. Van Leeuwenhoek’s microscope only
had a single lens with radius of curvature of roughly 0.7 millimeters. He was the first to see microorganisms and
blood cells. Of the 500 microscopes
manufactured by Van Leeuwenhoek, about ten still survive.
In the eighteenth century,
improved glass, coupled with multiple objective lenses with smaller focal
lengths that could see much finer detail, led to much better microscopes. Stages were added so that samples under
investigation could be held securely.
The nineteenth century brought the familiar microscope form with its
firmly mounted, vibration-free optical tube.
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