By Chad Potts
Vice President, Munday Scientific
Owner, Munday Scientific / Microscope Marketplace

There is a generation of microscope technicians and specialists that is slowly fading away.

These were the guys who could take a microscope apart, diagnose a problem by feel, rebuild it, align it, and put it back into service. They didn't learn everything from a YouTube video or a service manual. A lot of their knowledge came from decades of standing at a bench, working beside somebody who had been doing it longer than they had.

Names like Neil Bingham, Dewey Rainey, Scott Munday, and Danny Duncan come to mind.

These guys represent decades and decades of microscope knowledge and experience.

Thankfully, much of that knowledge isn't disappearing with them.

A lot of these men have taken the time to pass what they know down to us at Munday Scientific and Microscope Marketplace. That's something I appreciate more today than I probably did when I first came into this business.

I entered the microscope business 16 years ago.

Back then, I heard the same prediction over and over again:

"Digital is going to take over."

"Nobody is going to look through a microscope anymore."

"Slide scanners are coming."

And they were right about part of it.

Digital pathology is here. Slide scanners are here. Digital imaging has become a huge part of microscopy, pathology, research, education, and laboratory medicine. It has a footprint, and that footprint will continue to grow.

But something else happened.

The microscope stayed.

Sixteen years later, we're still rebuilding them. We're still selling them. We're still servicing them. We're still shipping them all over the country and around the world.

And people still like looking at the glass.

There is something about sitting behind a quality microscope, moving across a slide, changing magnifications, adjusting the focus, and seeing the specimen directly with your own eyes that technology hasn't completely replaced.

Maybe someday it will.

But I wouldn't bet against the microscope.

What Happens to the Next Generation?

This is the part I think about more and more.

Over the next ten years, another generation of microscope technicians is going to retire.

Who's going to replace them?

Microscope service isn't something you completely learn from a book. You can read a service manual. You can watch a video. You can understand the theory.

But there's a tremendous amount of knowledge that only comes from doing it.

You learn what something is supposed to feel like.

You learn what something is supposed to sound like.

You learn how to recognize a problem that isn't obvious.

You learn the little tricks that someone else learned 30 years ago and showed you at a workbench one afternoon.

That's the knowledge we have to protect.

At Munday Scientific and Microscope Marketplace, we're fortunate to have learned from people who spent their careers working on microscopes. Our responsibility now is to make sure that knowledge doesn't stop with us.

We have to teach the next generation.

Will Microscopes Still Be Around?

Ten years from now, will laboratories still be using traditional microscopes?

Probably.

Twenty years from now?

I think so.

They may look different. Digital imaging will continue improving. AI will become a larger part of pathology. Slide scanners will get faster and better. Remote consultation will become even more common.

But I don't believe the glass slide and microscope are disappearing anytime soon.

If anything, I think we're going to see traditional microscopy and digital technology continue to work alongside each other.

A microscope doesn't have to lose for digital pathology to win.

There is room for both.

We've already watched that happen for the past 16 years.

Passing It Down

One of the greatest assets in our industry isn't sitting on a shelf.

It's knowledge.

It's the knowledge that people like Neil Bingham, Dewey Rainey, Scott Munday, Danny Duncan, and so many others accumulated over entire careers.

We're fortunate that many of these men were willing to pass that knowledge along.

Now it's our job to preserve it, use it, and eventually pass it to somebody else.

Technology will change.

The equipment will change.

The way laboratories operate will change.

But somewhere tomorrow morning, somebody is still going to sit down behind a microscope, put a glass slide on the stage, look through the eyepieces, and start their day.

And I think that's pretty cool.

— Chad Potts
Vice President, Munday Scientific
Owner, Munday Scientific / Microscope Marketplace