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    • T. Regan Baird

    Ssustainability program director and Americas sales manager, Microscopy Division

    T. Regan Baird, Ph.D., is the sustainability program director and Americas sales manager, Microscopy Division at Lumencor (Beaverton, OR).

    Data courtesy of Mark Sanders, Director, Twin Cities University Imaging Centers, University of Minnesota
    To investigate the bleaching rate of fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) with different light sources, 1mM FITC in water under a coverslip was collected with a Nikon E800 and 40x, 0.75 numerical aperture objective at 1 s intervals for 1 min using a CoolSNAP MYO camera (Photometrics). The red dotted line represents a 120 W metal-halide source at full power with the microscope shutter set to block illumination between exposures using an enhanced green fluorescent protein (eGFP) filter set. The green solid line is similar, using the cyan line of the self-shuttering Lumencor SpectraX Light Engine at full power, pulsing at 1 ms intervals during the 1 s exposure. Note t0 = 2,000 counts and 5,081 counts for metal-halide and light engine, respectively.
    Fluorescence

    FLUORESCENCE MICROSCOPY/LIGHT SOURCES: Light engines: Lighting the way to mercury-free microscopy

    T. Regan Baird
    Nov. 19, 2013
    Fluorescence microscopes and other scientific instruments still rely on mercury-based light sources -- despite associated costs and hazards and many mandates to eliminate the ...