ConfoCor 2 — The Second Generation of Fluorescence Correlation Microscopes

Abstract

The initial idea to develop a commercial instrument for fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) was given to Carl Zeiss by Manfred Eigen and Rudolf Rigler in 1993. In cooperation with EVOTEC BioSystems Hamburg, Germany), Zeiss designed a system under the trademark ConfoCorto measure autocorrelation functions to study molecular interactions in solutions. The first FCS workshop by Zeiss with the new system was made in cooperation with Rudolf Rigler on October 24th, 1995, at the Karolinska Institute. Two years later a first prototype of a ConfoCorbased on a two channel detection system for the measurements of FCS cross-correlation was developed at Zeiss. Two systems were given to Manfred Eigen and Rudolf Rigler's laboratories for evaluation. The two channel FCS system, ConfoCor2, will be discussed in this Chapter. It is based on their experiences but is designed using a large part of the technological solutions developed originally for the Zeiss laser scanning microscope LSM 510 The result is a more flexible handling of multiwavelength excitation and detection for cross-correlation studies, as well as a principal experimental setup for combining both of the technologies in the near future.