Natural Science Forum / Physics / Optics / April 2006

Hi again,

I have a question with anyone who's had a chance to work with closely with
both the older 160mm Zeiss objectives and the newer ICS optics,
particularily with water immersion lenses.

I recently purchased a Plan-Neofluar 63x/1.2 water objective from Ebay for
what I think (hope) was a decent price; $350.00 USD.  I've read many
accounts of how the newer infinity-corrected Pl-Neofluar 63x's (which seem
to have many of the same technical details of the TL=160mm except for a
longer working distance in the newer design) are ideal for live cell work,
due to refractive index mismatch between immersion oil and the water-based
media live cell are observed in.   (See link for clarification):

http://www.microscopyu.com/articles/optics/waterimmersionobjectives.html

Zeiss has identifed their new Plan-Neofluar water objectives as LCI Plan-
Neofluars ("Live Cell Imaging") because of that reason.  They also have
added a correction collar for correcting for different temperatures; 23 and
37degC.

My question is regarding the older TL=160 63x/1.2 W objectives.  As they
seem very similar, will it perform as well for live cell work?  Obviously
without the temperature correction adjustment there will be some refractive
index mismatch if the objective is used at physiological temperatures, but
I suspect much less than an oil immersion objective would have.

Has anyone used these older water objectives for live cell imaging (with
fluorescence)?  If so how well do they work in regards to brightnesss,
image sharpness and being able to focus into water based samples without
adding excess spherical abberation?

Thanks,

Kevin