Yes definitely a great extension would be to add a camera in the image plane (alternatively, defocusing the image slightly and using a photodiode would also be fun!)
yes ! but it also assumes you have: a good optical breadboard + bench + dampeners, a beautiful set of lenses, all sorts of nice lasers and kinematic mounts and linear stages etc etc
so yes, we _also_ (back in my phd lab) built equipment in that sense, but there was a pretty good foundation of Fairly Fancy stuff already sitting around !
All of those parts can also be acquired through alibaba for a stiff discount off the thorlabs pieces though. Whilst some labs have fancy stuff going around, a significant amount don't and there isn't very good equipment sharing between labs at most institutions.
I think getting an electron source and creating a robust-ish adjustable set up is v doable, but is definitely more of a Real Project(TM) than this silly little interferometer :)
> Ok, time to confess: I did cheat a little in calling it the “cheapest” Michelson interferometer, since technically even this beam splitter is like 16 USD, but it is very possible to use a microscope slide instead at the cost of some contrast, which will net out to < 20 cents, even at pretty expensive per-unit prices.
Yes! Michelson interferometers are an amazing first lab experiment since it teaches you the basics of a bunch more techniques which are handy in more advanced experiments, while still having a satisfying outcome when done correctly (which is not as finicky as other experiments with less fun outcomes).
I think there's just such a huge middle ground that's missing (for funny historical reasons[1]) between "children's toy" and "lab-grade equipment" especially in optics, which is why I was excited to make this my first foray into making a fully 3d printed "useful-ish" thing that doesn't really exist otherwise.
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[1] This is because most lab equipment was made _in the lab_ back in the 60s or so, and having this technical ability was a huge advantage for many labs. Now, personnel cost/hours are much more expensive relative to equipment, so people will pretty much pay whatever to get lab-grade stuff.
I haven't read the post yet because my work blocks access to the domain.
I agree there is a huge middle ground- for example, I make hobby microscopes at home, and much of my work has been making accurate and precise 2D/3D stages. It's easy to buy great, simple (non-motorized) scopes with good optical quality, but as soon as you start adding motorized stages, or any sort of complicated illumination or filtering, it gets challenging quickly. My actual goal is to track microbes in real time using computer vision, but the professional hardware to do so is out of my price range.
I have spent literally thousands of hours fiddling with one part or another Today, I'm working on a high speed flash illuminator that is coupled to the camera, and it's one problem after another. Reality has a fractal level of detail.
Since I haven't been able to look at your project yet, I don't know if you worked on this area, but I found it really useful to clone the Thorlabs cage system components: https://www.thorlabs.com/optical-cage-systems and specifically https://www.thorlabs.com/item/CXY2A (you can download their 3D model and see that the mechanism isn't that complex).
Another thing I've ended up doing is prototyping in plastic and then having it machined at a place like JLCPCB out of aluminum. PLA is just flexible enough (especially under load) that it can make the results very frustrating.
Yes this is very cool (hope you make it open source :) but have you taken a peek at the openflexure project? They make a fully motorized 3-axis microscope that is 3d printed and relatively inexpensive (parts+motors+electronics - PLA net out to USD 250?)
it’s very cool! maybe you can also take some ideas from there :)
I don't particularly like the openflexure approach. Instead, I build stages similar to standard XY stages: https://www.asiimaging.com/products/stages/xy-inverted-stage... which uses standard motion components (linear rail and linear bearings, 3d printer style steppers), all of which gets mounted on aluminum extrusion (4040). Then the illuminator and camera just get mounted on the aluminum extrusion.
typically around one micron (which is about the same as one pixel with my objective and camera). I am not trying to take min steps. I'd rather have smooth motion, with fairly high accuracy.
The current system I am building is mainly optimized around scanning large areas quickly; I have already demonstrated that I can create accurate stitches by moving, stopping, taking photo, repeat, but it's slow (due to the stopping) so I am working on an approach that keeps the stage moving constantly, but triggers a bright flash that freezes intermediate exposures. This gives a good 10X speedup over the simpler model of move/stop/photo/repeat but brings in a number of other challenges.
that one has uhh substantially less drift for what it's worth, but reprinting in more stable material would help that a ton (and still be quite cheap!)
Yes definitely a great extension would be to add a camera in the image plane (alternatively, defocusing the image slightly and using a photodiode would also be fun!)