For more information on the pine cone, have a look at the following post: The specimen size is approximately 20mm from left to right.

If you can not see anything, then you need to install a flash player. The image shows the cross section of the stem of the Aristolochia sipho plant. The image is an inverted (negative) image, and not a dark-field image. Why did I choose to invert the colors? The reason is surprisingly unscientific: it simply [...]

Several years ago, at a time when digital single-lens reflex (SLR) cameras were still financially unobtainable, I used slide film to document my microscopic observations. These slides are now sitting, more or less nicely sorted, in a folder, doing pretty much nothing. I don’t even have a slide projector to look at them. Evidently the [...]

The microscopes in the school where I work have been in operation almost 30 years (!!) now. And the fact that most of them have remained usable says quite something about the quality of these devices. They are soon going to be collectively sent in for maintenance, and this is the last opportunity to do [...]

A quick Google search of the term “microbe hunting” revealed 2460 hits, the term “microbe hunter” a mere 21300 hits. The combination of these words with “amateur microscopy” returned a total of… 1 and 4 hits respectively. This is not much. The one returned hit is particularly interesting. It is from Popular Science, September 1934, [...]

Mitosis stages of the lily flower. The chromosomes are well visible.

Vascular tissue of a Buttercup, Ranunculus, root.

A tick in dark field. Ticks are parasites that feed on blood. They are known to transmit a variety of diseases, such as Lyme disease (borreliosis) and tick-borne encephalitis.