Digital implementation of a laser scanning confocal microscope using image enhancement algorithms

The authors discuss a digital implementation of a laser scanning confocal microscope (LSM) using a Texas Instruments TMS320C30 single-chip digital signal processor. The digital image enhancement algorithms of the digital confocal microscope (DCM) perform in software what the LSM does in hardware. The optimized hardware of the TMS320C30 completes the numerically intensive confocal algorithms in as little as 4 s. The benefits of the DCM include greater flexibility, better overall performance, and lower system system cost than the LSM. In some cases, the DCM permits processing on specimens that could not be processed using the LSM