THE OCTOBER 2003 EXHIBITION

The 2003 Exhibition of Microscopy was held in the Flett Theatre of the Science Museum. My subjective impression is that it was even better attended than the last year. At all events the theatre was pleasantly full by mid-afternoon.

The problem I have at these meetings is that my time is divided between meeting old friends, talking about my own demonstations or exhibit, circulating to see other exhibits, and last, but not least, acting as web reporter! So naturally I cannot get round all the interesting things to see, and therefore this report is somewhat selective; however here are some of the things that caught my eye:

Above: Bruce Scott demonstrates that it is possible to take fine 'macrographs' without a microscope. He is using a computer scanner to copy the slide direct.

Phil Greaves, seen on the left of the opening picture, showed some splendid slides of flies in amber. I didn't check with Phil what the age of the amber was, but I always like to think that it's possible that the gut is filled with dinosaur blood...

An unusual subject was shown by Fred Price: human saliva. This is dried and then shows these crystal formations, as seen under dark-ground-illumination. Fred suggests that they are some organic compound.

Brian Darnton is an expert on foraminifera. Here he adjusts his microscope to show how much detail is shown with transmitted light, instead of the more usual incident illumination. The forams are from Holland.

Barry Ellam always has interesting and impressive presentation. His exhibit this time was centred around the virtues of parabolic dark ground illumination. Two slides are shown below: an unstained plant section (Butchers Broom), and a Fairy Fly.

 

Michael Bingley (right) examines Brian Davidson's showed a fine collection of various stands; under each was a platinocyanide salt show with crossed polars and various phase plates. These produced some truly gorgeous effects.

 

 

 

Towards the end of the day the President, Maurice Moss, thanked everybody for coming,and especially Bruce Scott and Tony Dutton for all the hard work put into the organisation of the event.

He also announced the result of the judges decision on the Barnard Award for photomicograpy; this went to Alan Jones for his fine pictures of living rotifers (Ed. Hooray!)

A very good day was had by all, and thanks are due to the refreshment staff for an endless supply of light refreshments.