"Xiaowang, I can barely understand your explanation, and there's not much issue with the inference, but I'm not sure if the microscope..."

Xu Yun blinked and quickly understood Old Su's intention:

"Sir, are you asking...if a microscope can be made?"

"Indeed."

Xu Yun paused for a moment and continued:

"It isn't too difficult to make a simple microscope. It's rumored that within the Wind Spirit Moon Shadow sect, this belongs to extremely simple technology, as long as you have hands, that's enough.

However, just like syringes and generators, making a microscope also requires spending some money and effort on materials..."

Upon hearing this, Old Su hurriedly asked:

"Xiaowang, what items are needed?"

Xu Yun thought for a moment and named a few items:

"Firstly, of course, you need glass, and not just any glass.

One type needs to be made from volcanic mineral, and the other requires a unique silvery-gray clay from the Western Jiangnan Dao.....

Then there are various items like glue, wood, nails, and so on.

Also, some of the alcohol prepared earlier is needed."

DIY microscope.

In the tech hobbyist community of future generations, this is considered a very simple task.

Of course.

This refers to the optical microscope.

Students whose biology teacher didn't die of frustration should know.

The principle of the microscope is actually quite simple; put bluntly, it's just five words:

Convex lens imaging.

The structure of the microscope mainly consists of the eyepiece, objective lens, stage, and reflector.

Both the eyepiece and the objective lens are convex lenses, with different focal lengths.

Moreover, the focal length of the objective lens should be less than that of the eyepiece.

The objective lens is akin to the lens of a projector, forming an inverted, magnified real image of the object.

The eyepiece is akin to an ordinary magnifying glass, through which the real image becomes an upright, magnified virtual image.

Therefore, the image of the object viewed through a microscope to the human eye is an inverted, magnified virtual image.

The reflector is used to illuminate the object being observed, generally having two reflective surfaces:

One is a plane mirror, used when the light is strong.

The other is a concave mirror, used when the light is weak, which can converge light.

As for the magnification of the microscope, it's also straightforward; the value of the eyepiece X the objective lens is the magnification.

Currently, the maximum magnification of an optical microscope is 1600 times, and those claiming optical microscopes can magnify tens of thousands of times are just bluffing.....

This magnification limit involves the diffraction limit, where a point light source forms a diffraction spot.

At this magnification, regardless of increasing the lens's refractive index or stacking lenses to increase magnification, it will become meaningless—at least within the realm of optical microscopes.

Of course.

Speaking of microscopes, one must mention its inventor.

This person, like the American cockroach, is an old background character.

Exactly!

This person is none other than...

Robert Hooke.

In fact.

According to later research, the person who truly thought of the microscope's working principle and invented the first microscope should be the Janssen father and son in 1595.

But these two unfortunate souls didn't use these instruments for any significant observations and did nothing after making them, then just died.

Thus, in historical records, the invention rights of the microscope became a battleground between two other people:

Levin Hook and Robert Hooke.

The confusion between these two is so high that even the biology textbooks made mistakes.

Let's first define it by the time point:

In terms of microscopes, Robert Hooke's invention was twenty years earlier than Levin Hook's.

However, the magnification of Hooke's microscope was only 20 times, while Hooke's was up to 270 times.

Therefore, the correct saying should be that Hooke invented the microscope, and Hooke invented...or rather improved the high magnification microscope.

Additionally, in terms of biological contributions, Hooke discovered cells, but what he observed were slices of cork.

Hooke magnified and found small compartments, which he named with the English word 'cell'.

But in reality.

What he observed were dead cells, merely the remaining plant cell walls.

Whereas Levin Hook observed living microbial bacteria, thus he is considered the founder of microbiology.

This is akin to both Hooke and Hooke tinkering with a time machine, with Hooke traveling 4 million years back and discovering a creature's skeleton, naming it a dinosaur.

Hooke's technology was slightly better, traveling 65 million years back and seeing real, living dinosaurs.

The latter's discovery is obviously more complete, but due to the former's earlier discovery, the discoverer of dinosaurs remained as the former.

In short.

Hooke discovered the cell wall and named the cell.

Hooke discovered bacteria, observed the complete cell structure, and thus defined microorganisms.

Meanwhile, the former invented the microscope.

The latter invented the high magnification microscope.

This is the historical truth that even biology books can't clarify.

Returning our focus back.

According to Xu Yun's design, the entire DIY process of the microscope has two key points:

First is to ensure the objective lens images at the eyepiece's object focal point, specifically calculated using f′(x)=$\frac{1}{3}$.

The second is the magnification issue.

The first person in the world to discover the optical microscope's limit magnification was Ernst Abbe, who invented the 1500 magnification optical microscope in 1874.

The resolution is about 200 nanometers, which is half the shortest visible light wavelength.

Therefore, creating an optical microscope by hand doesn't actually require much assistance from modern equipment.

As a tech enthusiast who has handmade two-digit microscopes, Xu Yun is naturally aware of one thing:

In ancient society, there are two types of materials that can perfectly achieve the combination of refractive and dispersion indices.

These are crown glass and flint glass.

In the 21st century, crown glass was basically tied together with Zeiss lenses.

But actually.

It is a type of glass with an Abbe number greater than 50, also known as lanthanide glass.

The local lanthanide mine sites are primarily in Inner Mongolia and Jiangxi, which are the Western Jiangnan Dao of the Tang Dynasty and the West Jiangnan Road of the Song Dynasty, and in later eras, where chili water would flow from the tap.

Combined with the distinctive properties of lanthanide rare earths, it shouldn't be hard for Old Su to find them.

As for volcanic glass, it's even simpler.

As the name suggests.

It's a type of mineral product found in volcanic craters.

Although there's a slightly troublesome aspect to these two, in that if not handled properly, they might retain some scary radioactive elements like thorium.

But if the process is done properly, all of these can be avoided easily.

Once the raw materials are gathered, through a series of techniques like stirring glass solutions and plano-convex lenses, superb achromatic lenses can be prepared.

By then, although not reaching the extreme magnification, at least a magnification of 900 times shouldn't be difficult.

During the observation with a microscope, a low magnification lens of 100 can view red blood cells, while 400 times can see more clearly.

To see the detailed structure of bacteria, a 1000 times lens is needed, which has a small field of view and requires agents to expand it.

Additionally, staining is needed; otherwise, the shadow of the bacteria can't be seen.

Therefore, a 900 times microscope is already a very practical instrument.

To put it bluntly.

Such a magnification microscope, Old Su might not discover all its uses until the day he dies.

Of course.

Considering the relatively special raw materials of the microscope, even just transporting them is quite troublesome.

Xu Yun conservatively estimated that it's already fortunate for the materials to be ready within a week.

Hence, the specific manual process has to be postponed for a while, to be discussed later.

More importantly.

There is another matter to prioritize right now.

Which is...

Wang Yue's intravenous injection.

After all, if the garlic extract solution isn't injected soon, it's hard to say when Old Su might kick the bucket.

This Lord Middle Marquis might really be in trouble.....

....

Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.