Barath, Harini
(2016)
Through the looking glass.
I wonder (2).
pp. 90-94.
Abstract
ew of us can forget the first time we managed
to make brick-like rows of cells, peppered with
dots of cytoplasm, appear from a flimsy piece
of stained onion peel after twiddling the wheels of a
school microscope. An indispensable tool in many labs,
the microscope is an instrument that helps us examine
objects that are too small to be seen by our naked eye.
This powerful invention has opened up the previously
invisible world of cells and microorganisms to us. Even
today, microscopes form the spine of many major
areas of life science research, like cell biology.The first microscopes date back to the early 1600s.
While it is not clear who the original inventor was, it is believed that the term ‘microscope’ was coined in
1625 by a friend of Galileo Galilei, a German doctor
and botanist named Giovanni Faber 1 . In the years
that followed, the microscope was increasingly
used to examine and record biological structures.
The most memorable contributions to the field of
microscopy came about 50 years later, by Antonie
van Leeuwenhoek, celebrated today as ‘the father of
microbiology’.
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