Leica Microsystems GmbH is a German microscope manufacturing company. It is a manufacturer of

optical microscope The optical microscope, also referred to as a light microscope, is a type of microscope that commonly uses visible light and a system of lenses to generate magnified images of small objects. Optical microscopes are the oldest design of microsc ...

s, equipment for the preparation of microscopic specimens and related products. There are ten plants in eight countries with distribution partners in over 100 countries. Leica Microsystems emerged in 1997 out of a 1990 merger between Wild-Leitz, headquartered in Heerbrugg Switzerland, and Cambridge Instruments of Cambridge England. The merger of those two umbrella companies created an alliance of the following 8 individual manufacturers of scientific instruments. American Optical Scientific Products, Carl Reichert Optische Werke AG, R.Jung, Bausch and Lomb Optical Scientific Products Division, Cambridge Instruments, E.Leitz Wetzlar, Kern & Co., and Wild Heerbrugg AG, bringing much-needed modernization and a broader degree of expertise to the newly created entity called Leica Holding B.V. group. In 1997 the name was changed to Leica Microsystems and is a wholly-owned entity of Danaher Corporation since July 2005. Danaher is a US venture capital company.

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The company employed over 4,000 workers and had a $1 billion turnover in 2008. It is headquartered in

Wetzlar Wetzlar () is a city in the state of Hesse, Germany. It is the twelfth largest city in Hesse with currently 55,371 inhabitants at the beginning of 2019 (including second homes). As an important cultural, industrial and commercial center, the un ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

, and represented in over 100 other countries. The company manufactures products for applications requiring microscopic imaging, measurement and analysis. It also offers system solutions in the areas of Life Science including biotechnology and medicine, as well as the science of raw materials and industrial quality assurance. Product categories include Virtual microscopes,

Light microscope The optical microscope, also referred to as a light microscope, is a type of microscope that commonly uses visible light and a system of lenses to generate magnified images of small objects. Optical microscopes are the oldest design of microsco ...

s, products for

Confocal Microscopy Confocal microscopy, most frequently confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) or laser confocal scanning microscopy (LCSM), is an optical imaging technique for increasing optical resolution and contrast of a micrograph by means of using a s ...

, Surgical Microscopes, Stereo Microscopes & Macroscopes, Digital microscopes, Microscope Software, Microscope Cameras,

Electron microscope An electron microscope is a microscope that uses a beam of accelerated electrons as a source of illumination. As the wavelength of an electron can be up to 100,000 times shorter than that of visible light photons, electron microscopes have a hi ...

Sample Preparation Equipment Sample preparation equipment refers to equipment used for the preparation of physical specimens for subsequent microscopy or related disciplines - including failure analysis and quality control. The equipment includes the following types of machine ...

In the field of high resolution

optical microscopy Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultravio ...

they produce commercial versions of the

STED microscope Stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy is one of the techniques that make up super-resolution microscopy. It creates super-resolution images by the selective deactivation of fluorophores, minimizing the area of illumination at the focal p ...

offering sub-diffraction resolution. In 2007 they launched the TCS STED which operates at a resolution <100 nm. In 2009 they launched the TCS STED CW using a CW laser light source where a resolution <80 nm can be achieved. On 29 September 2011 Leica Microsystems and TrueVision 3D Surgical announced their intention to jointly produce products that will improve microsurgery outcomes in

ophthalmology Ophthalmology ( ) is a surgical subspecialty within medicine that deals with the diagnosis and treatment of eye disorders. An ophthalmologist is a physician who undergoes subspecialty training in medical and surgical eye care. Following a medic ...

and

neurosurgery Neurosurgery or neurological surgery, known in common parlance as brain surgery, is the medical specialty concerned with the surgical treatment of disorders which affect any portion of the nervous system including the brain, spinal cord and pe ...

under the Leica brand.

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