Leica confocal microscope

Responsible persons

If you have any troubles please contact Sven or Jan.

For beginners

If you like to work with the microscope please ask one of the responsible person for an introduction, first!

Handling

1. Turn on the green button
2. Turn around the key for the laser
3. Switch on the devices to the left and right side of the screen. (In case there seems something to be wrong, check if the flash drive is really plugged in and if the small connection cable under the table is not lose)
4. Open the LAS AF program
5. Click ok

Objectives and lasers

• There are 3 objectives (10x, 63x and 40x (Oil objective))
• On the left side of the microscope is the TL/IL button for turning on the normal light
• There are also 3 common laser lines used:
  • 488 nm: 1. Button on the front left side
  • DAPI: 3. Front left side
  • Red channel: middle one right side
• On the front is also the button for the shutter

Helpful stuff

• Acquire mode: Experiment → new → rename with your title
• Acquisition mode:
  • Zoom factor → never use below 1.1
  • Format: 512 x 512 just for looking around
  • Gain: 800 is often ideal
  • Offset: -1 - -20
• On the bottom left side is the start button for making pictures
• Saving a file → save all user Data ( please make your own folder and don’t save on the desktop
• You can save them as a .lif file
• But you can also export them: export serie → e.g. as .jpeg file
• If you like to save them as on overlay picture → check overlay channels
• If you like to have them a single pictures per channel, don’t check
• Check micron scale → a scale bar will be added to your pictures
• You need to transfer all your data to a flash drive, for using it on another computer

Shutting down

• Clean the objective from oil etc.
• Close the program
• Turn the key
• Shut down computer
• Switch of device on the left and right side
• When everything is turned of, turn off of the green switch