Overview:
Traditional transmitted lamps used on microscopes have several limitations. They don’t auto-shutter (turning off and on is rather slow, and requires the addition of a mechanical shutter for high speed multi-site acquisition), they change color spectrum as brightness is increased or decreased, and they have a rather short lifetime. To top it off, they produce a lot of heat while powered on. Sutter has released a new illuminator which can replace these older units, and which does a nice job of eliminating all of the problems associated with conventional illuminators.
I’ve recently had a chance to check out the new Sutter Instruments T-LED Illumination system at my company office. As with all Sutter products, it’s a well designed system which provides a great level of integration and control, while being built into a tough component housing. I’m sure I’ll see this product used in labs 10 years down the road, just as I find Sutter’s hallmark Lambda 10-X series humming along today, with a decade or more of use on them.
So what is the TLED? It’s a complete replacement package for any conventional incandescent microscope illuminator. The TLED provides several advantages over traditional illuminators, all drawn from the inherent advantages of LED technology.
What’s in the box:
Our TLED arrived with an adapter for the Nikon FN-1 microscope, a LED illumination head, the controller module, and a power supply. This is everything needed for manual control of the unit. All components were easy plug and play. There was no confusion on what connector gets attached where. The control unit is machined from solid aluminum and has a nice high quality, weighty feel to it.
Usage:
The lamp attachment replaces any microscope’s old incandescent illuminator box. Simply remove the old illuminator (if equipped) and insert the appropriate Sutter scope adapter into the old position. From there attach the new TLED illumination head, and connect the head cable to the controller module. You now have a stable, bright, and low temp illuminator for your scope.
Automation is very well integrated. You’ll note several flip switches on the front of the
controller unit. One switch controls system power. The second switch supports TTL override. This is a great feature as it makes control from a computer very straightforward. If you have a printer port, or if you have a National Instruments style TTL Box, you can simply attach a BNC connecting cable to the back of the TLED Control unit, and the lamp will turn on when receiving a TTL “ON” signal. When on, the lamp sets it’s brightness by the user attenuation knob on the front panel. You can also connect a camera shutter control cable to this unit, and there is a switch on the back of the unit to invert the control line response. If you have a microscope like the Nikon Ti-E, you can simply attach an (optional) Nikon Smartshutter connection cable to the scope, and connect the smartshutter cable to this unit. This effectively provides “shutter” control out of the box, eliminating the need for a mechanical shutter, and saving the scope buyer from purchasing an external shutter control module
Conclusions
This system effectively replaces a conventional illuminator and shutter combo, saving the customer somewhere between $1000-2000 USD, depending on the scope configuration. Lifetime can be thought of as unlimited, and the quality of the light is superior to traditional lamps. The output is extremely bright, and should be suitable for all contrast enhancing transmission modalities like DIC, Phase and Darkfield. In short, the disruptive nature of LED technology is continuing it’s push into our market, with the typical results of cost savings, ease of use, and new capability. I’m glad to see that Sutter is capitalizing on this market evolution. If you have a chance to use a TLED, or get a demo for one, please add your observations below!
-Austin