Seventeen Radiolarian Shells, Barbados (pleurax mt)

WalterD · Post by **WalterD** » Mon May 08, 2017 8:53 pm

For the readers who are not familiar with the subject : these are the fossil shells of radiolarians, microorganisms that mostly live in the warmer seas and oceans and resemble sun-animalcules (heliozoa). The shells or microscopic "glass houses" they're in have ever since their discovery in the 19th century, been very attractive to microscopists.
This post covers one of the storage slides I received recently, containing cleaned material found in calceous rock material on Mount Hillaby, Barbados.
I've used this for making strew slides with a random selection of different shapes. Observation method no.1 was brightfield combined with polarisation and use of the 50x/1,0 Leitz oil immersion objective. Besides that also colour DIC was used in a number of images. Mountant of choice was pleurax which I started using a couple of months ago for (attempted) diatom slides. The high refractive index (1,70) combined with the oil immersion provide a closer, more detailed look and gives an idea about their 3-dimensional shape.

Thanks for looking.

Note: The first six images are all 50x/1,0 oil. If you know more about the individual ID's I'll be pleased to learn.

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Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Mon May 08, 2017 10:51 pm

Beautiful! Radiolarians are fantastic subjects.

Jacek · Post by **Jacek** » Tue May 09, 2017 12:44 am

Very nice

Marek Mis · Post by **Marek Mis** » Tue May 09, 2017 3:52 am

Excellent images ! I love them all. But the fourth and the fifth one I like the most.

Marek

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Tue May 09, 2017 6:08 am

Brilliant images!
If you do stack with Zerene it would be nice to see stereos to highlight the 3D structure.
I also have and love the Leitz 50/1 oel

WalterD · Post by **WalterD** » Tue May 09, 2017 8:42 pm

Hi all,

Thanks for your appreciation. I've added 6 more photographs, 10,11 and 12 in color DIC 25x/0,55 objective
@ Pau: Yes, my favourite objective as well, that 50x/1,0. Just curious: do you also like/utilize the 63x/1,30?
Stereo is a very interesting option indeed. Not that long ago I was convinced you needed 2 separate cameras for that (one on each binocular eyepiece). Understood it's a bit of a "tweak" or option in Zerene, which I also use. Will try to work on that as well....
Besides that I use photoshop for manual stacking.

Cheers,

Walter

hkv · Post by **hkv** » Wed May 10, 2017 2:07 pm

Very nice! Fantastic subjects for sure!

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Wed May 10, 2017 2:15 pm

Just curious: do you also like/utilize the 63x/1,30?

No, I don't have it. I have the Zeiss Planapo 63/1.4 that is excellent but has an extremely short working distance (it likely would crash a radiolarian if trying to focus at is lower part)

zzffnn · Post by **zzffnn** » Wed May 10, 2017 4:08 pm

Beautiful images! Thank you for sharing!

carlos.uruguay · Post by **carlos.uruguay** » Thu May 11, 2017 5:32 am

Absolutely beautiful photos!!!!

WalterD · Post by **WalterD** » Thu May 11, 2017 8:46 pm

Thank you again. To finalize this post 5 more images...(all 50x/1,0)

René · Post by **René** » Fri May 12, 2017 3:45 am

Gorgeous Walter! You want to exchange some slides? I've got a nice brackish bloom on my hands right now!

best wishes, René

carlos.uruguay · Post by **carlos.uruguay** » Fri May 12, 2017 7:10 am

SUPER!!!

Smokedaddy · Post by **Smokedaddy** » Fri May 12, 2017 10:06 am

Excellent

WalterD · Post by **WalterD** » Fri May 12, 2017 11:13 pm

Glad to read you're all still enjoying this post!

@Rene, nice idea to swap samples, allow me to pm you.

Cheers,

Walter