Low-cost 3D printed lenses for brightfield and fluorescence microscopy

Abstract

We present the fabrication and implementation of low-cost optical quality 3D printed lenses, and their application as microscope objectives with different prescriptions. The imaging performance of the 3D printed lenses was benchmarked against commercially available optics including a 20 mm focal length 12.7 mm diameter NBK-7 plano-convex lens used as a low magnification objective, and a separate high magnification objective featuring three 6 mm diameter NBK-7 lenses with different positive and negative focal lengths. We describe the design and manufacturing processes to produce high-quality 3D printed lenses. We tested their surface quality using a stylus profilometer, showing that they conform to that of commercial glass counterpart lenses. The 3D printed lenses were used as microscope objectives in both brightfield and epi-fluorescence imaging of specimens including onion, cyanobacteria, and variegatedHostaleaves, demonstrating a sub-cellular resolution performance obtained with low-cost 3D printed optical elements within brightfield and fluorescence microscopy.

Printing, Characterising, and Assessing Transparent 3D Printed Lenses for Optical Imaging

“…The demonstrated optical performance of 3D printed lenses shows great promise for optical imaging and prototyping optical instrumentation. Moreover, we have shown separately that 3D printed lenses can be implemented in bioimaging applications, using both absorption and fluorescence imaging modalities [50]. The potential impact of these accessible and open manufacturing methods could also impact across low resource settings for rapid diagnostics of blood smears, for example, where 3D printing has already made significant impacts.…”