LASER SCANNING MICROSCOPE WITH SPECTRALLY RESOLVING RADIATION DETECTION

Abstract

The invention is directed to a laser scanning microscope with a detector device for spectrally resolving radiation detection. The detector device has at least one dispersive element, on which a beam of the radiation to be detected impinges and which fans out this beam spectrally, and at least two detector line arrays to which the spectrally fanned out radiation is directed and whose sensitivity is only adjustable in a unitary manner. At least two detector line arrays are provided in the detector device, each of them being irradiated by spectrally fanned out radiation of different spectral composition. The respective spectral composition of the radiation and the basic spectral sensitivity of the detector line arrays are taken into account in the sensitivity adjustment of the detector line arrays.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 shows a microscope with a detector module according to a first embodiment form of the invention;

FIG. 2 shows a microscope with a detector module according to a second embodiment form;

FIG. 3 shows different sensitivity curves for detector line arrays which can be applied in the embodiment forms according to FIG. 1 or FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 shows details of the connection of the detector line arrays schematically; and

FIG. 5 shows a microscope with a detector module according to the prior art.

Claims

1. A laser scanning microscope with a detector device for spectrally resolving radiation detection, said detector device comprising: at least one dispersive element, on which a beam of the radiation to be detected impinges and which fans out this beam spectrally; andat least two detector line arrays to which the spectrally fanned out radiation is directed and whose sensitivity is only adjustable in a unitary manner and which is irradiated by spectrally fanned out radiation of different spectral composition;wherein the respective spectral composition of the radiation and the respective basic spectral sensitivity of the detector line arrays are taken into account in the sensitivity adjustment of each detector line array.

2. The microscope according to claim 1, wherein the at least two detector line arrays are arranged downstream of a shared dispersive element.

3. The microscope according to claim 1, wherein a plurality of dispersive elements are provided and the beam that is divided beforehand impinges thereon, the plurality of dispersive elements acting upon at least one detector line array in each instance with radiation that is spectrally fanned out differently.

4. The microscope according to according to claim 1, wherein the spectral region detected by the individual elements of the detector line arrays is between 1 nm and 100 nm.

5. The microscope according to according to claim 4, wherein the spectral region detected by the individual elements of the detector line arrays is between 20 nm and 50 nm.

6. The microscope according to according to claim 1, wherein each detector line array has a scintillator layer with individual photomultiplier elements arranged downstream, wherein the scintillator layers of the detector line arrays differ with respect to their spectral sensitivity.

7. The microscope according to according to claim 1, wherein each detector line array is connected to its own operating circuit which carries out the sensitivity adjustment.

8. The microscope according to claim 7, wherein operating circuits are connected to a control device of the microscope which sends control signals to the operating circuits and receives detection signals of the detector line arrays and individually adjusts the sensitivity of the detector line arrays by the control signals taking into account the most intensive spectral region of the detection signals.

9. A method for spectrally resolved detection of radiation in a microscope, wherein a beam of the radiation to be detected is spectrally fanned out to at least one beam bundle and is directed to at least two detector line arrays whose sensitivity is only adjustable in a unitary manner, wherein the sensitivity of each detector line array is adjusted taking into account the respective spectral composition of the radiation and the basic spectral sensitivity of the detector line arrays.

10. The method according to claim 9, wherein at least two detector line arrays detect the radiation of a spectrally fanned out beam bundle.

11. The method according to claim 9, wherein a plurality of spectrally fanned out beam bundles are used, each of them acting upon a detector line array.

12. The method according to claim 9, wherein photomultiplier arrays which each have a scintillator layer are used for the detector line arrays, wherein the spectral sensitivity of the scintillator layers is selected differently.