Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives

[Paul Lebel]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Dear confocal community,
Does anyone know of where I could buy discontinued or used (in very good
condition) Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives, 40x or higher? It seems their
higher magnifications are discontinued. Alternatively, if anybody knows
other objectives with high transmission ratio down to 260 nm it would be
greatly appreciated. Other deep UV threads on this list mostly discuss
light sources and multiphoton excitation approaches - I did not see much
discussion on sourcing UV imaging optics but apologies if I missed an
existing, relevant thread.

High NA reflective objectives are also an option, but it would seem that
accessible off the shelf models are aberration-limited (for example
thorlabs LMM-40X-UVV-160 includes a zemax model showing a ray spot diagram
limited to 1.2 um resolution). I have not seen models of other similar
objectives, but they are for the most part also two-mirror Schwarzschild
layout and so also limited to two correcting surfaces. It occurs to me that
the lithography community would be a great source of high resolution
reflecting optics, but I am much less familiar with that field.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Paul


--
Paul Lebel, PhD
Senior R&D Engineer
Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
499 Illinois Street, San Francisco

[Tobias Baskin]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Paul,
         I have had good luck with this kind of thing (not exact thing)
from Vermont Optechs. http://www.scopeshop.com. No finanical ties, just
a happy customer.
         Good luck,
                             Tobias

On 10/4/17 12:01 PM, Paul Lebel wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
> *****
>
> Dear confocal community,
> Does anyone know of where I could buy discontinued or used (in very good
> condition) Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives, 40x or higher? It seems their
> higher magnifications are discontinued. Alternatively, if anybody knows
> other objectives with high transmission ratio down to 260 nm it would be
> greatly appreciated. Other deep UV threads on this list mostly discuss
> light sources and multiphoton excitation approaches - I did not see much
> discussion on sourcing UV imaging optics but apologies if I missed an
> existing, relevant thread.
>
> High NA reflective objectives are also an option, but it would seem that
> accessible off the shelf models are aberration-limited (for example
> thorlabs LMM-40X-UVV-160 includes a zemax model showing a ray spot diagram
> limited to 1.2 um resolution). I have not seen models of other similar
> objectives, but they are for the most part also two-mirror Schwarzschild
> layout and so also limited to two correcting surfaces. It occurs to me that
> the lithography community would be a great source of high resolution
> reflecting optics, but I am much less familiar with that field.
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> Thanks!
>
> Paul
>
>

--
       __    ___   ^    ___   ___   Tobias I. Baskin
      /  \  /     / \  /      \      Professor
     /   / /     /   \ \       \      Biology Department
    / __/ /__   /___  \ \       \__    University of Mass.
   /     /     /       \ \       \      611 N. Pleasant St.
  /     /     /         \ \       \      Amherst, Massachusetts
/     /___  /           \ \___/   \_____ USA  01003    413-545-1533
   www.bio.umass.edu/biology/baskin                       BLOG: blogs.umass.edu/baskin/

[Alex GT]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

There are couple used Zeiss Ultrafluar on eBay 80x/0.95 and 120x/0.95


-----Original Message-----
From: Confocal Microscopy List [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Paul Lebel
Sent: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 12:02 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Dear confocal community,
Does anyone know of where I could buy discontinued or used (in very good
condition) Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives, 40x or higher? It seems their higher magnifications are discontinued. Alternatively, if anybody knows other objectives with high transmission ratio down to 260 nm it would be greatly appreciated. Other deep UV threads on this list mostly discuss light sources and multiphoton excitation approaches - I did not see much discussion on sourcing UV imaging optics but apologies if I missed an existing, relevant thread.

High NA reflective objectives are also an option, but it would seem that accessible off the shelf models are aberration-limited (for example thorlabs LMM-40X-UVV-160 includes a zemax model showing a ray spot diagram limited to 1.2 um resolution). I have not seen models of other similar objectives, but they are for the most part also two-mirror Schwarzschild layout and so also limited to two correcting surfaces. It occurs to me that the lithography community would be a great source of high resolution reflecting optics, but I am much less familiar with that field.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Paul


--
Paul Lebel, PhD
Senior R&D Engineer
Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
499 Illinois Street, San Francisco

[Benjamin Smith]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

If a small spot size is what you are after, a quick web search popped up
the following objectives from the lithography field:
https://www.corning.com/media/worldwide/csm/documents/c3e0616ab18a4af8a02b05e18d7631d3.pdf

An older variant of this objective was sited in the following paper:
https://ac.els-cdn.com/016793179390017Y/1-s2.0-016793179390017Y-main.pdf?_tid=47276092-a993-11e7-898e-00000aab0f6c&acdnat=1507183748_3367eb4bd65a27afe5bd792fe7b42b5f

There is another good paper here using the 198nm objective for metrology:
http://proceedings.spiedigitallibrary.org/pdfaccess.ashx?url=/data/conferences/spiep/24914/894_1.pdf

Cheers,
   Ben Smith



On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 9:39 PM, Alex GT <[hidden email]> wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
> *****
>
> There are couple used Zeiss Ultrafluar on eBay 80x/0.95 and 120x/0.95
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Confocal Microscopy List [mailto:[hidden email]]
> On Behalf Of Paul Lebel
> Sent: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 12:02 PM
> To: [hidden email]
> Subject: Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives
>
> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
> *****
>
> Dear confocal community,
> Does anyone know of where I could buy discontinued or used (in very good
> condition) Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives, 40x or higher? It seems their
> higher magnifications are discontinued. Alternatively, if anybody knows
> other objectives with high transmission ratio down to 260 nm it would be
> greatly appreciated. Other deep UV threads on this list mostly discuss
> light sources and multiphoton excitation approaches - I did not see much
> discussion on sourcing UV imaging optics but apologies if I missed an
> existing, relevant thread.
>
> High NA reflective objectives are also an option, but it would seem that
> accessible off the shelf models are aberration-limited (for example
> thorlabs LMM-40X-UVV-160 includes a zemax model showing a ray spot diagram
> limited to 1.2 um resolution). I have not seen models of other similar
> objectives, but they are for the most part also two-mirror Schwarzschild
> layout and so also limited to two correcting surfaces. It occurs to me that
> the lithography community would be a great source of high resolution
> reflecting optics, but I am much less familiar with that field.
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> Thanks!
>
> Paul
>
>
> --
> Paul Lebel, PhD
> Senior R&D Engineer
> Chan Zuckerberg Biohub
> 499 Illinois Street, San Francisco
>

--
Benjamin E. Smith, Ph. D.
Imaging Specialist, Vision Science
University of California, Berkeley
195 Life Sciences Addition
Berkeley, CA  94720-3200
Tel  [phone]
Fax [phone]
e-mail: [hidden email]
http://vision.berkeley.edu/?page_id=5635 <http://vision.berkeley.edu/>

[Johannes Helm]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Dear Paul,

please, note that the name of these objective series was - and still is,
although, as far as I know, production has been discontinued -
"Ultrafluar" with "a", NOT "Ultraflu_o_r". When using E-bay or other
sources, as had been suggested in an earlier response by user "Alex GT",
one should nevertheless check out both spellings, since the wrong name
"Ultrafluor" has, specifically in the anglophone world, been used for
decades.

Also, one should note that these objectives, albeit outstanding in
transmission from the limits of VUV and to the IR, do exhibit
comparatively strong axial and lateral chromatic aberrations. Also,
while they are anastigmatic, indeed, the curvature of their field of
view is comparatively strong.

The source of this information is partly Dr. Höcherl at Zeiss, at this
time quite certainly retired since many years, who, in the late 80s and
early 90s let me know a lot of details about these lenses, when my task
had been to built a CLSM for Fura-2 measurements. I had been lucky at
that time to have a 32x Ultrafluar on loan from Dr. Thorbjörn Caspersson
together with a Bausch & Lomb couple of 32x catadioptric objective and
condenser from Dr. Rudolf Rigler, both at the Karolinska Inst. in Solna,
Sweden. Both gentlemen at this time are retired, Dr. Caspersson had
already been in his early 90s at that time. I do not have the slightest
idea who is in charge of these marvelous lenses at this time.


Also, one should take great care when buying old style Ultrafluars,
which still had been made for 160mm tube length microscopes. They will
exhibit strange properties when used on infinity corrected microscopes.
If one, however, gets lenses of the newer type, made for infinity
corrected microscopes, one should also make sure to get the appropriate
tube lens. While the standard tube lens for the Axio-series of
microscopes was a single lens - very tricky and intelligently adapted to
the Zeiss objectives to minimize aberrations -, the tube lens for the
Ultrafluars was an achromatic doublet. Using the Ultrafluars on wrong
tube lengths microscopes or together with an inappropriate tube lens may
render them more or less useless.

Last and possibly not least: Some of these lenses were Glycerin
immersion lenses made for coverslips from SiO2, 200microns in thickness.
While fused silica is optically isotropic, good transmission values for
the deep UV can be attained for coverslips from crystalline quarts, but
these exhibit polarization effects due to the birefringence of the
crystalline material. There was also a 100x/0.95 Ultrafluar dry lens for
cover slip thickness 0, i.e. one for reflected light microscopy on
metals or minerals. I am personally not sure whether there ever had been
any 80x or 120x lenses by Zeiss. If these should be offered on E-bay, I
would, indeed, carefully check the source.

Best wishes,

Johannes


On 2017-10-04 18:01, Paul Lebel wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your
> posting.
> *****
>
> Dear confocal community,
> Does anyone know of where I could buy discontinued or used (in very
> good
> condition) Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives, 40x or higher? It seems their
> higher magnifications are discontinued. Alternatively, if anybody knows
> other objectives with high transmission ratio down to 260 nm it would
> be
> greatly appreciated. Other deep UV threads on this list mostly discuss
> light sources and multiphoton excitation approaches - I did not see
> much
> discussion on sourcing UV imaging optics but apologies if I missed an
> existing, relevant thread.
>
> High NA reflective objectives are also an option, but it would seem
> that
> accessible off the shelf models are aberration-limited (for example
> thorlabs LMM-40X-UVV-160 includes a zemax model showing a ray spot
> diagram
> limited to 1.2 um resolution). I have not seen models of other similar
> objectives, but they are for the most part also two-mirror
> Schwarzschild
> layout and so also limited to two correcting surfaces. It occurs to me
> that
> the lithography community would be a great source of high resolution
> reflecting optics, but I am much less familiar with that field.
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> Thanks!
>
> Paul

--
P. Johannes Helm

Voice: ([phone] (office)
Fax: [phone] (office)

[Paul Lebel]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Dear Johannes,
Thank you for your detailed reply, and also for the spelling correction. Especially useful to me are your tips on residual aberrations and the information about tube lens types. If the aberrations are largely chromatic in nature, I should be able to minimize their effects as I will be using LED illumination with a relatively narrow bandwidth (I could also filter it further if needed). Also, I have the flexibility of an open breadboard platform so I can adapt to either older style 160 mm finite conjugate or to infinity-corrected with a tube lens, depending on what I am able to procure. In the infinity-corrected case, do you know if the standard Zeiss tube lenses also transmit down to 260 nm? It would seem like they would need to do so in order to ensure compatibility with the Ultrafluar series, but at the same time it sounds very restrictive on their design, given the limited choice of glasses at that wavelength. Finally, yes I plan to use 200um quartz coverslips with my samples and birefringence is duly noted.

Thanks also for the many other replies with suggested sources for Ultrafluar and lithography objectives!
Regards,

Paul

[Alex GT]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

From memory:  Getting 360nm laser on LSM510 confocal required major upgrades to  Zeiss microscopes $$. So standard Zeiss lens would not handle 260nm.

Alex Tkachenko
Lab Director
Zorbius BioPharma

-----Original Message-----
From: Confocal Microscopy List [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Paul Lebel
Sent: Friday, October 06, 2017 1:20 PM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Dear Johannes,
Thank you for your detailed reply, and also for the spelling correction. Especially useful to me are your tips on residual aberrations and the information about tube lens types. If the aberrations are largely chromatic in nature, I should be able to minimize their effects as I will be using LED illumination with a relatively narrow bandwidth (I could also filter it further if needed). Also, I have the flexibility of an open breadboard platform so I can adapt to either older style 160 mm finite conjugate or to infinity-corrected with a tube lens, depending on what I am able to procure. In the infinity-corrected case, do you know if the standard Zeiss tube lenses also transmit down to 260 nm? It would seem like they would need to do so in order to ensure compatibility with the Ultrafluar series, but at the same time it sounds very restrictive on their design, given the limited choice of glasses at that wavelength. Finally, yes I plan to use 200um quartz coverslips with my samples and birefringence is duly noted.

Thanks also for the many other replies with suggested sources for Ultrafluar and lithography objectives!
Regards,

Paul

[Johannes Helm]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

On 2017-10-06 19:20, Paul Lebel wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your
> posting.
> *****
>
> Dear Johannes,
> Thank you for your detailed reply, and also for the spelling
> correction. Especially useful to me are your tips on residual
> aberrations and the information about tube lens types. If the
> aberrations are largely chromatic in nature, I should be able to
> minimize their effects as I will be using LED illumination with a
> relatively narrow bandwidth (I could also filter it further if
> needed). Also, I have the flexibility of an open breadboard platform
> so I can adapt to either older style 160 mm finite conjugate or to
> infinity-corrected with a tube lens, depending on what I am able to
> procure. In the infinity-corrected case, do you know if the standard
> Zeiss tube lenses also transmit down to 260 nm?

Hi, again, Paul,

answer, unfortunately: No!

As you correctly write, few refractive materials are available for
designing optics to be used in the deep UV. While there might be more,
today, than had been available during the 80s and 90s, at that time they
had to live with a couple of fluorites and calcites. Also, if I remember
correctly, neither the mechanical properties of the available materials,
which had a tendency to easily crack when being formed, nor the
tightness of the tolerances to be kept during lens fabrication left the
craftsmen specifically happy, to place it mildly. Seemingly, designing
was far less of a problem than building.

The standard tube lens of the old Axio series - I do, and rather
unfortunately so, have no clue about Zeiss' more and most modern optics
- was good, as far as I remember, to somewhere between 380nm and 370nm,
at which the limit for imaging purposes primarily was not set by the
drop of the rate of transmission but rather by aberrations. As you quite
certainly know, in most materials the refractive index changes per nm
get larger and larger the more you approach the absorption limit. A
plethora of interesting data is available from the Schott Glass
Catalogue (and possibly other and similar sources).

Best wishes and have a good success in your research!

Johannes

> It would seem like
> they would need to do so in order to ensure compatibility with the
> Ultrafluar series, but at the same time it sounds very restrictive on
> their design, given the limited choice of glasses at that wavelength.
> Finally, yes I plan to use 200um quartz coverslips with my samples and
> birefringence is duly noted.
>
> Thanks also for the many other replies with suggested sources for
> Ultrafluar and lithography objectives!
> Regards,
>
> Paul

--
P. Johannes Helm

Voice: ([phone] (office)
Fax: [phone] (office)

[George McNamara]

*****
To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
*****

Not a major upgrade if purchased up front.

 From my memory: I managed a Zeiss LSM510 (4 PMT) confocal microscope in
Miami with a UV Argon ion 351 nm & 364 nm laser line. Yes, the laser was
finicky (and we eventually retired it).

My GUESStimates (and these are only gueses) is that Zeiss sold over 2000
LSM510s and probably 10% (i.e. 200) had this 351/364 nm laser (maybe more).



On 10/6/2017 1:27 PM, Alex GT wrote:

> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
> *****
>
>  From memory:  Getting 360nm laser on LSM510 confocal required major upgrades to  Zeiss microscopes $$. So standard Zeiss lens would not handle 260nm.
>
> Alex Tkachenko
> Lab Director
> Zorbius BioPharma
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Confocal Microscopy List [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Paul Lebel
> Sent: Friday, October 06, 2017 1:20 PM
> To: [hidden email]
> Subject: Re: Zeiss Ultrafluor objectives
>
> *****
> To join, leave or search the confocal microscopy listserv, go to:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=confocalmicroscopy
> Post images on http://www.imgur.com and include the link in your posting.
> *****
>
> Dear Johannes,
> Thank you for your detailed reply, and also for the spelling correction. Especially useful to me are your tips on residual aberrations and the information about tube lens types. If the aberrations are largely chromatic in nature, I should be able to minimize their effects as I will be using LED illumination with a relatively narrow bandwidth (I could also filter it further if needed). Also, I have the flexibility of an open breadboard platform so I can adapt to either older style 160 mm finite conjugate or to infinity-corrected with a tube lens, depending on what I am able to procure. In the infinity-corrected case, do you know if the standard Zeiss tube lenses also transmit down to 260 nm? It would seem like they would need to do so in order to ensure compatibility with the Ultrafluar series, but at the same time it sounds very restrictive on their design, given the limited choice of glasses at that wavelength. Finally, yes I plan to use 200um quartz coverslips with my samples and birefringence is duly noted.
>
> Thanks also for the many other replies with suggested sources for Ultrafluar and lithography objectives!
> Regards,
>
> Paul

--


George McNamara, PhD
Baltimore, MD 21231
[hidden email]
https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgemcnamara
https://works.bepress.com/gmcnamara/75   (may need to use Microsoft Edge or Firefox, rather than Google Chrome)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/browse/collection/44962650
http://confocal.jhu.edu

July 2017 Current Protocols article, open access:
UNIT 4.4 Microscopy and Image Analysis
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cphg.42/abstract
supporting materials direct link is
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cphg.42/full#hg0404-sec-0023
figures at
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cphg.42/figures