Dermatologists use it to study skin cancers, the FBI uses it for fingerprint comparison, tire manufacturers use it to examine tire tread marks, and now the National Museum of Health and Medicine has one too.
A portable, digital, video microscope made by Scalar Corp. in Japan was recently donated by Scalar and the Cole-Parmer Instrument Co. of Vernon Hills, Ill. to be added to the world's largest and most representative collection of microscopes at the museum. The instrument has the combined functions of a microscope and digital camera. After magnifying an image, the handheld device takes a picture and displays it on a small, attached screen. The image is stored on a disk so it can be used later or electronically mailed.
"This microscope is a key addition to our national medical collections for a variety of reasons," said Adrianne Noe, Ph.D., museum director. "It extends the chronological reach of our world-famous Billings Microscope Collection into the newest applications of microscope technologies and it is a concrete example of the changing nature of medical practice and scientific capabilities."
Lt. Col. John S. Billings, museum curator from 1883 to 1893, began the museum's microscope collection, which is made available for education and study.
"The museum has the largest collection of microscopes anywhere, so it seemed complementary to pair the earliest microscope with the most recent," said Noelle Weber, marketing manager at Cole-Parmer.
Weber presented the microscope to Jim Connor, Ph.D., the museum's assistant director for collections, and Alan Hawk, manager of the museum's historical collections. While on a tour of the museum, she was able to see how such donations preserve history.
"This donation further strengthens the museum as the premier repository for the study of the history of the microscope," said Dr. Connor. "Our collection now spans five centuries of the technical development of this instrument-- from the era of Robert Hooke's handcrafted microscope to that of today's digital technology."
