microscope invention

MICROSCOPE  INVENTION

Today, we'll explore the invention of the microscope. In biology class, it brought a whole new world into focus. The microscope gave us technology and a better quality of life.

So it's worth examining just how it came to be. Glass was invented about 22-hundred B-C. In the 1st century, Romans discovered if they made the glass thick in the middle and thin on the edges, objects viewed through it looked larger.

People started using lenses more toward the end of the 13th century when eye glasses were made. Magnifying glasses, the earliest of microscopes, came shortly thereafter.

It wasn't until 1590 when the forerunner to the modern microscope was invented. Two Dutch spectacle makers, Zaccharias Janssen and his son Hans found that the proper combination of lenses in a tube, made objects appear greatly enlarged. Their invention was the first compound microscope: which uses two or more lenses and is still in use today.

Galileo, the father of modern physics and astronomy, heard of these early studies. Through his own experiments, he harnessed the power of glass. In doing so, he designed a superior microscope that included a focusing knob.

Then, Anton van Leeuwenhoek, the father of microbiology, developed techniques to grind and polish glass. He made small lenses with great curvatures. With his lenses, his microscopes were able to magnify more than 200 times. He saw things never seen before: bacteria, yeast, blood cells and tiny animals swimming in a water drop.

Microscopes are now are so powerful, it's the equivalent of being able to see a penny on your football stadium seat from outer space. Microscopes continue to be a researcher's enduring partner bringing into focus tiny worlds we endeavor to understand.