wLS LED Light Source for Easy Fluorescence Imaging

15 Jan 2015

The wLS broad-band LED illumination unit is designed to provide a long-life alternative to traditional Mercury and Mercury Metal Halide fluorescence excitation sources. The broadband excitation covers common fluorophores, ranging from DAPI to Cy5, allowing existing filter cubes and protocols to remain in place. Unlike other broad-band LED solutions, the wLS provides rapid control over individual excitation LED wavebands (Ultraviolet, Blue and Green/Yellow/Red). This enables the use of multiband pass filters instead of individual filters, followed by slow mechanical filter changes during multi-label imaging.

LED excitation provides many advantages over traditional fluorescence light sources, most notably eliminating one source of toxic Mercury from the lab. It also lowers operating cost with its 25,000 hour LED lifetime, which consumes 80% less energy.

A control handset is included which provides instant on/off and intensity control in increments of 1% to 100%, over each individual Ultraviolet, Blue, and Green/Yellow/Red (GYR) excitation waveband. When used with a QImaging camera, the on/off control is easily accomplished with the cameras expose out signal and the wLS TTL input. The wLS further extends control to popular microscopy automation and analysis packages with its USB interface.

Upgrading an existing microscope is easy. The wLS supports a comprehensive range of microscope adapters that fit to current and older microscope systems. A 3mm liquid light guide option is available for hard to adapt or non-microscope systems.

Features Include: 

• LED lifetime to 25,000 hours
• No dangerous Mercury lamps to change every 300 hours
• Excites common fluorescence labels in single and multiband sets
• No need to change filter sets
• Ready to go when you are
• Stable with minimum warm up and cool down
• No mechanical shutters to wear out
• No ND filters required
• Stable and repeatable
• Maximizes light coupled to specimen
• Produces optimal uniformity across FOV
• Minimal alignment
• Easily integrates into your experiment
• Easily share a light source between microscopes