I have just attended the 50th anniversary of EMSA in Boston, and what a grand show it was! Appropriately enough the organizers had brought together an impressive number of the pioneers in microscopy, and Sterling Newberry even prepared a book describing the early days of electron microscopy and a video in which said pioneers reminisce about how things were.

The attachment of devices to the eyepiece of a microscope is a long accepted practice among microscopisis; almost as soon as a new technical advance appears, someone is adapting it to the study of microscopic specimens. Photomicrography was in use from almost the earliest days of photography, while the microspectroscope was developed and described by Sorby as early as the 1860's. As advances in technology provided improved means for recording data and collecting radiation invisible to the human eye, these were rapidly adapted to the microscope as add-on accessories constructed as one-of-a-kind instruments or in a few cases as commercial products.

The Biological Images Project is the culmination of the four summers I have spent at Apple Computer. In short is is a software package which allows students to manipulate and explore biological images (i.e. micrographs, CTs, MRIs, etc.), Consisting of four sections - interface, biological images, image processing, and communication software - this package can serve as a powerful educational medium. The interface supports the more traditional forms of teaching - textual notes and brief lectures. The collection of biological images allows students to visualize biological structures in ways they never have before and exposes them to a variety of scientific techniques and tools. Image processing lets the student interact with the images, to manipulate, explore, discover and in some ways gain ownership of the image. Finally the communication package will provide the students a medium to share their discoveries in an interactive manner and submit them to peer review.

The EMSA Undergraduate Scholarship Program was developed in 1988 to encourage students to consider microscopy-related careers. Over the years, the program has expanded to include seniors as well as junior undergraduate students. The scholarship application includes a research proposal (including budget) written by the student, and letters of recommendation from a faculty member and project advisor. The response to the 1992 EMSA Undergraduate Scholarship Program was excellent, both in terms of student responses and quality of applications.

Traditional methods of sample preparation and analysis in conventional transmission electron microscopy (TEM) are not readily applicable to multicomponent complex liquids which may contain a wealth of microstructural information. Two techniques which facilitate the study of structure in such liquids are freeze-fracture (FF) TEM and cryo-TEM.