Reviewing The Pros And Cons Of Using A Cordless Microscope
This article will discuss about the pros and cons of using a cordless microscope. By understanding the limitations of a cordless microscope, you should be able to decide if you should use a cordless microscope or not.
The Powerful Microscope
Microscopes have indeed transcended time with the onset of latest technologies. Moreover, their applications have broadened. Microscopes are now generally used in classrooms, laboratories, and other applications which require extreme magnification. They are considered as one of the most valuable scientific devices ever invented by the scientific community. In order to get a magnified view of a specimen, the microscope needs to illuminate the specimen. There are two ways of illuminating the specimen. Light can pass through the specimen using transmitted illumination. Another way would be to bounce the light off the specimen using reflected illumination. Most of the microscopes in use today utilize transmitted illumination. One of these is the cordless microscope. But then you ask, what could be the pros and cons of using a cordless microscope?
The Need to Develop Cordless Microscopes
Cordless microscopes are developed to address several concerns. Even if the microscope is installed with a powerful lens, ambient or room lighting is not powerful enough to illuminate the specimen. This is why most microscopes have an electric lamp or some other artificial way of producing the desired amount of light. Most of the times, the electric lamp is installed on the stand or base of the microscope with an electrical cord plugged into the usual 120 volt AC outlet. If the microscope is used internationally, an adapter needs to be plugged in as well. But using an electrical cord to plug the microscope to an outlet causes a lot of problems. A lot of classrooms and laboratories don’t have that many available outlets where the microscopes need to be plugged in. In order to remedy this, a lot of bulky and unsightly extension cords and power strips for multiple plug-ins have to be used.
Another problem with using electrical cords is that most laboratory technicians, researchers, teachers, and students like to move their microscopes a lot of times around their room. This means that the electrical cords have to be unplugged and replugged to another power outlet or use a bulky extension cord or install a power strip. Another concern is that this type of microscopes can’t be used outdoors or in other places where there is no AC power outlet to plug them into.
The Older Design
There have been previous designs of cordless microscopes. However, the design of current cordless microscopes has various disadvantages. One of these disadvantages is that most microscopes with sophisticated designs require relatively high wattage light bulbs in order to produce a large amount of illuminating power. Because of this, a good quality cordless microscope has an operating life which is very short between battery charges and needs to have a large battery to provide power to the bulb. In order to solve this problem, there are some cordless microscopes which use bulb that eat up lower watts. These low-wattage cordless microscopes are only good as toys. Cordless microscopes used for education and scientific applications can’t use low-wattage bulbs as they can’t produce enough illumination.
Another disadvantage of cordless microscopes and in other type of microscopes is that halogen, fluorescent, or tungsten bulbs are installed which produce an excessively large amount of heat. This excess heat can raise the temperature of the specimen which could be hot enough to burn the specimen or the bulb could either burn out or blow up and damage the microscope. The bulb can be cooled down by using fans. But this requires additional power for the fans. The fan added to the instrument also increases the cost to build and install it and the microscope will be even more complex as it already is.
One other disadvantage of the cordless microscope and other type of microscopes is that when the bulb burns out or blows up, it needs to be replaced. This means that the base or stand of the microscope has to be partially dismantled in order for the bulb to be accessed, removed, and then replaced.
Improving the Light Source
Because of the disadvantages of using a halogen, fluorescent, or tungsten bulb, another source of light which could produce the same amount of illumination is needed. This improved light source has to operate at temperatures lower than conventional bulbs and should consume a little amount of power which could be provided by a battery pack that is small and can be recharged. One such light source comes from Light Emitting Diodes or LEDs which is mounted on a circular circuit board coated with reflective material. And so here you have it. These are the pros and cons of using a cordless microscope. This should help you decide whether you need a conventional microscope or a cordless microscope.
