We make extensive use of optical microscopy for both collection of petrography data (textural and modal analysis) and also for more descriptive work.

We are well equipped with research grade, Zeiss optical microscopes capable of :

• Transmitted plane and cross polarised light
• Reflected illumination (for investigation of reflective minerals)
• Epifluorescence microscopy

All the microscopes are equiped with digital cameras (with live view imaging on attached PC’s), and we have stepping stages (but driven using our own, in-house, software) that we use for modal analysis and acquisition of images for preparation of digital thin-sections and deep zoom images.