Nikon SoRa spinning disk confocal
Technology Focus
Spinning Disk Confocal microscopes use a spinning disk of pinholes to reject out of focus light resulting in optical sectioning. (See figure – in-focus light passes through the pinholes to reach the camera). Unlike a point scanning confocal, the whole field of view is simultaneously illuminated and the image captured on a camera chip. The resulting improvement in speed and the lower light load makes a spinning disk confocal ideal for live imaging.
Lightpath of a spinning disk confocal. A micro-lens disk focuses laser light through the pinholes of the primary disk. In-focus returning light from the sample passes back through the pinholes and is separated by a dichroic mirror to scan across the sensor of a CMOS or CCD camera.
Figure credit – https://www.photometrics.com
The SoRa Disk contains a modified micro-lens pinhole array which enables optical photon reassignment. This gives rise to a 1.4x resolution improvement over standard spinning disk technology.
The water pump allows multi-area, timelapse and high-content plate screening with the high NA water objectives by maintaining the meniscus across large distances of stage travel and negating evaporation.
Training requests and equipment bookings are done through PPMS