Hi Jarek.
polarized light microscopy is very popular among chemists and pharmacists
involved in crystal polymorphism research, so there is some literature
available. I suggest reading Walter McCrone's books:
McCrone, Walter C., McCrone, Lucy B. and John Gustav Delly, Polarized Light
Microscopy, McCrone Research Institute, Chicago, 1999.
McCrone, Walter C., Jr., Fusion Methods in Chemical Microscopy; A Textbook
and Laboratory Manual, Interscience Publishers, New York, 1957.
The second one is rather more relevant with hot-stage microscopy. Also see
if you can access the Particle Atlas, also by W. McCrone, either the
electronic version, or the six volume printed version, through your
institution's library.
Regarding the equipement, this is not so easy to answer in a few lines. It
depends on the size of your samples and method of preparation. I mean, for
biological samples such as cell cultures but also for large mineral
specimens, inverse microscopes are very popular. For powder samples, an
ordinary upright microscope is fine.
In general, you can obtain a polarization microscope at a cost of ca. 8,000
euros or slightly less. The optics used in such microscopes are usually
Fluorite Plan lenses with the indication "strain free" (an appropriate
condenser should be chosen), and the microscope is additionally equiped with
a polarizer and an analyser prism. If the polarizer and analyzer are fully
rotatable (usually not both of them are), then you can extinguish any
individual grain (or crystalline material) at will. Then again, this feature
might not interest you, it depends on the application you have in mind.
Additionally, if you intend to use the microscope with a hot-stage, then you
should definitely make sure you get long working distance lenses.
That's all I can say at the moment. You have to decide on what you plan to
do, and then I could provide more information. In any case, I don't think
you need a highly sophisticated metallographic microscope, which is more
expensive and maybe too much for biological samples.
Finally, since this is an ImageJ specific list, and not a general discussion
forum on microscopy, this may be a little off-topic and not of interest to
other list subscribers. In case you need further information we could
continue the communication "outside" the list, unless other members are also
interested.
Kyriakos Kachrimanis.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jarek Grodek"
<
[hidden email]>
To: <
[hidden email]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2007 2:39 PM
Subject: polarization microscopy for cereal grain
> hello,
>
> last days i was thinking about new challenge for my studies (PhD student
> at Institute of Agrophysics of Polish Academy of Sciences) and i thought
> about application of polarization microscopy for examination of
> microstructure of cereal grain and its endosperm.
>
> Can anyone "show me the path" of this technique and maybe propose
> equipement for this purpose?
>
> Maybe someone knows literature about this problem?
>
> thanks in advance,
>
> greetings
>
> jarek
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