Polarized light microscopy isn’t your everyday type of scope observation! Usually used in the field of geology for observing rocks and minerals, polarizing microscopes are also useful in the fields of metallurgy, chemistry, biology, and physical medicine, and they’re used for observing how different substances in the same sample reflect and refract light differently from one another, which can then reveal clues about their properties. Materials that possess this quality are known as anisotropic, and viewing them under polarized light increases the contrast between them in ways that observing these materials under non-polarized light cannot.

The discovery of light passing through a polarizing filter is credited to William Nicol, a Scottish scientist who found calcite crystals polarized light passing through them in 1828. This paved the way for the polarized light microscopy we use today. Modern polarizing microscopes come in all shapes and sizes, from mono or stereo viewing to rotatable polarizers and stages to even trinocular formats, all of which makes it easier than ever to observe how samples appear when illuminated with polarized light sources. No matter what type of polarizing microscope you’re looking for, you’ll find it right here at Microscope.com!