DIC condensers

Posted by Jeff Spector on
URL: http://confocal-microscopy-list.275.s1.nabble.com/DIC-condensers-tp7583008.html

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Greetings,
   This isn't exactly a "confocal" questions but I know a lot of "micoscopy
gurus" live on this list so I thought it a good place to ask this. I have a
colleague who is trying to image individual (i.e. small and diffraction
limited) microtubules in a flow chamber by using DIC. They are currently
using a 100x 1.45 oil Objective, but only a .52 LWD condenser. They were
using a solid state light source but couldn't get good image so we switched
to a lamp for illumination and the images are much better, and we can now
see the microtbules but there still isn't a lot of contrast.  My question
is, is it worth it to go to a high NA (perhaps oil immersion) condenser,
and can anyone think of why the lamp would give a better DIC image than a
solid state light source?
thanks in advance for the help...
 -Jeff