My date with a Microscope

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Written by Arohan Banik



Sometime in the beginning of December, Pranay and Shweta ordered something from Amazon. But I didn't know what was inside the box. Then I asked Shweta that what is inside, she said that there are some math books for Pranay. I thought that they were telling the truth. Then I kept asking Pranay that when you will open the box, but he said that I will open it after a few days. It was December 9th, on my birthday, when I cut my birthday cake at night, they gifted me the same amazon box. When I opened the box, it was a Microscope!! Then I finally knew that they were joking. It was a surprise!!

The time when I opened the cardboard box, I saw a big suitcase with the microscope. There were slides, cover slips, petri dish, collecting vials and more. So, with that, I could see cells with the microscope. The colour of the microscope is white and the base is black. The box also had an instruction because there are chemicals that are dangerous for me. The microscope is also a part of STEM crew. It’s a part of science and technology. It has a 20x eyepiece because if the other eyepiece is damaged or dirty then I can fix the new one. The slides make me see the cells that are spectacular to watch! There are tweezers that pick-up samples from one place to another. The collecting vials are for collecting stuff from nature. The micro-slicer and scalpel cut the specimens into small pieces. The petri dish is for cleaning and processing the specimens.

Suitcase with the microscope and other things!

There are some body parts of the microscope. The eyepiece is to see from the top to the specimen. The stage is for holding the slide. The illuminator has a mirror that reflects the light to the sample and that is how I can see the cells. There is an aperture dial that changes the colour of the filter and they are green, turquoise, blue and transparent colour. The arm is for holding the other body parts of the microscope. The focus knob is for focusing to see the cells.

Different body parts of the microscope

In the slide box, there were 5 prepared slides with different specimens. They were apple, broad bean leaf, onion bulb epidermis, cotton stem and goldfish scale. I saw all the cells from the slides using the microscope. So, from the apple slide, I found a medium-sized cell. And it was like a cat eye nebula! The colours of the cell were red, green, yellow and blue. From the cotton stem slide, the cell had borders on it that made the shapes of hexagons and pentagons, and the edge was coloured yellowish golden. The goldfish scale slide has many lines that were coloured red, yellow and green mixed up, and the scale colour is mostly blue. On the onion bulb epidermis, there were so many oval shapes that are coloured rainbow, and the boundary is blue. The broad bean leaf is coloured blue and yellow, and it’s like the observable universe!

Different specimens under the microscope

I like this educational toy, and now I will collect specimens from nature to look at new cells using the microscope. I really thank Shweta and Pranay for giving me such a wonderful gift on my birthday.  When this pandemic will go away, I will carry this microscope to school and show to my classmates how tiny cells look under the microscope.

 

Edited by my Dad

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