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Thanks for all the great ideas folks!
Have a great day!
Brian
----- Original Message ----
From: Sue Ann Heatherly <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2007 8:46:00 PM
Subject: Re: microscopes in museums
ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
*****************************************************************************
Yes, to what Charles said. What Wayne may be talking about is the visitor
interaction aspect, and focusing your own microscope has big emotional
reward for that visitor. I can remember vividly the first time I focused
in on pond scum. Goose bumps!
Sue Ann
NRAO-Green Bank, WV
> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related
> institutions.
> *****************************************************************************
>
> Alan,
>
> That's a great note. It harkens to the science of imaging things and
> is one of the reasons we have such a variety of scopes and
> techniques. It should be noted that the Monterey Bay Aquarium
> experimented with the "controlled" use of research grade dissecting
> scopes back in the 80's, which turn into a controlled visitor
> directed microscope demolition project and successfully replicated
> smaller experiments that we had run (just kidding!). User control is
> a key element in any microscope presentation and yet elusive to
> implement.
>
> Charles
> On Mar 30, 2007, at 3:59 PM, Alan J. Friedman wrote:
>
>> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology
>> Centers
>> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related
>> institutions.
>> **********************************************************************
>> *******
>>
>> One more note on the microscope discussion: I don't think anybody has
>> questioned Wayne's implied definition of a "real" microscope ("My
>> issue with
>> Wentz scopes is that at times I want the visitor to use a real
>> microscope.")
>>
>> I'll argue that the Wentzscope is a real microscope, as are the
>> various
>> video microscopes others have suggested. There ARE fake
>> microscopes--ones
>> sold for classrooms that look like compound microscopes but are
>> not. They
>> are simply slide viewers, and in place of an actual biological
>> specimen,
>> there are small small photographs on plastic slides. The
>> photographs were
>> taken through a real microscope, and that's as close to real as
>> these get.
>>
>> A real microscope has a compound lens system and lets you see a
>> real-time
>> view of an object of your choosing. A Wentzscope meets this
>> definition, as
>> do traditional laboratory microscopes, video microscopes, scanning
>> electron
>> microscopes, and so on. The school "microscope" I've described is
>> intended
>> to deceive, and offers no advantages over looking at a photograph
>> except
>> that it tricks students into thinking they are using a real
>> microscope.
>>
>> I am sympathetic with Wayne's desire to give visitors an experience
>> with an
>> instrument identical to those which professionals use, and which
>> visitors
>> will recognize as such. Many professionals today use video
>> microscopes, or
>> other devices that look nothing like the traditional design, but
>> visitors
>> probably don't realize that. So putting a classic Zeiss, Bausch &
>> Lomb,
>> Olympus, or other expensive instrument out seems to be an attractive
>> proposition. The difficulty is that they tend to be difficult to
>> use and to
>> break easily. Setting up visitors for failure isn't something we
>> want to
>> do.
>>
>> When the NY Hall of Science was developing its first microscope-
>> intensive
>> exhibition 20 years ago, we bought one of every major brand of
>> microscope
>> for prototype testing. We needed fairly high magnification to see
>> living
>> microbes. The microscopes we bought either broke down, or visitors
>> couldn't
>> figure out how to use them, or both. We also surveyed microscopes in
>> museums around the world, and didn't find anything that worked,
>> with the
>> exception of an early video microscope and a projection microscope,
>> but both
>> were too bulky and expensive for us. In France I saw an elaborate
>> exhibition with Zeiss research grade microscopes. The microscopes
>> were
>> surrounded by custom plexiglass cases, and only a couple of
>> controls could
>> be manipulated with friction-clutch knobs on shafts that stuck out
>> of the
>> cases. Even so, all of the microscopes in the exhibit were broken and
>> unusable.
>>
>> In response to our problem, Budd Wentz, who was a consultant for us
>> at the
>> time, finished a design he had in mind for years, and produced the
>> first
>> wooden-body Wentzscope. The rest of the story you know.
>>
>> So I see the challenge not one of getting real microscopes on the
>> exhibit
>> floor, but finding a way so that visitors realize that video
>> microscopes or
>> Wentzscopes are just as real as the iconic ones seen on television
>> in crime
>> labs.
>>
>> Alan
>>
>> ****************************************************
>> Alan J. Friedman, Ph.D.
>> Consultant
>> Museum Development and Science Communication
>> 29 West 10th Street
>> New York, New York 10011 USA
>> T +1 917 882-6671
>> F +1 212 673-2279
>> E [log in to unmask]
>>
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>
>
> Charles Carlson
> Director of Life Sciences
> exploratorium
> 3601 Lyon St.
> San Francisco, CA 94123
> [log in to unmask]
> Tel: 415-561-0319
> Fax: 415-561-0370
>
>
>
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