The Department of Ophthalmology requires a new inverted confocal laser-scanning microscope. The microscope system will need to be fully motorised to allow automatic scanning of defined areas to produce a montage, and to allow scanning of a volume of images in the Z-direction. It will need to have at least 4 lasers and 2 sensitive detectors to allow simultaneous labelling of multiple fluorophores.

The system will also have the ability to image using transmitted light with differential interference contrast. The specimen holder will need to accommodate slides, culture plates, flasks, and/or petri dishes. It will need to have a minimum of 6 objectives ranging from 4x, 10x, 20x, 40x to 60x, some of these will be oil immersion lenses. In order to image thicker specimens, some of these should have an extended depth of focus. The microscope will be software controlled with an acquisition PC. An antivibration table will be required.