Confocal Microscopy Literature References

The past several decades have witnessed a tremendous growth in the popularity of confocal microscopy techniques. Advances have been driven primarily due to the relative ease at which extremely high-quality images can be obtained from fixed and living specimens. Confocal microscopy offers several advantages over conventional widefield optical microscopy, including better imaging through rejection of information obtained from regions removed from the focal plane, the ability to collect serial optical sections from thick specimens, and the ability to regulate the depth of field. The key to confocal microscopy is the use of spatial filtering to eliminate out-of-focus light from specimens that are thicker than the focal plane.