Virtual pinhole dual-axes confocal microscopy based on CCD detector

In comparison with the conventional confocal microscopy, dual-axes confocal microscopy can use a low NA objective to achieve a high resolution, a large work distance and high S/N, due to the special dual-axes structure. The spatial resolution of a dual-axes confocal microscopy with virtual pinhole CCD is analyzed in theory and its corresponding experimental setup is established, and the axial response experiments are done using the established experimental setup. The full width at half a maxim (FWHM) in the axial direction is 2.63 μm achieved by using an illuminating lens of NA_i=0.117, a collecting lens of NA_c=0.106 and θ=45°. And it is about 20 times higher than the axial FWHM of conventional confocal microscopy with the same parameters.