A Foldscope™ is a portable microscope that is assembled from paper and a small lens; it can be used alone or in combination with a smartphone or tablet camera. Foldscopes™ can magnify up to 140X with a resolution of 2 microns, producing images comparable to those obtained with a basic light microscope. Foldscopes™ can provide students with direct access to the microscopic world via a safe, inexpensive activity that they can participate in without supervision, which makes them especially useful for online courses where students may not have access to standard laboratory equipment. In our online introductory courses for mixed majors, we use Foldscopes™ to observe chloroplasts in plants and algae and pigmented epidermal cells in red onion (Allium cepa), and guide students to consider the evolutionary and physiological significance of their observations. In the workshop, participants will assemble their own Foldscopes™, work through our students? activities, and provide suggestions for using Foldscopes™ in other contexts (such as field work, experimental work, face-to-face settings, and with other organisms); these suggestions will be included in the revised workshop manuscript.
Keywords: field studies, microscopy, online, cell structure, citizen science, Foldscope
University of Ottawa (2019)
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