Greg Egan on Nostr: Phase contrast microscopes were invented in the 1930s by the Dutch physicist Frits ...

Phase contrast microscopes were invented in the 1930s by the Dutch physicist Frits Zernike, and developed and manufactured by physicist and entrepreneur Caroline “Lili” Bleeker. Zernike won the Nobel Prize for this in 1953 ... but Bleeker held the patents, so she might not have been too disappointed.

The picture here shows how converting the *phase shift* in the light passing through an almost transparent cell into a *change in brightness* can improve the contrast and detail in the image.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase-contrast_microscopy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frits_Zernike
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lili_Bleeker