Abstract: An observation apparatus including: a top plate on which a container in which a specimen is accommodated can be placed, and through which illumination light can pass; a light source that emits the illumination light upward from below the specimen; an objective lens that focuses, below the specimen and the top plate, transmitted light which is the illumination light that has passed through the specimen from thereabove and that has passed through the top plate; and a camera that captures the transmitted light, wherein the light source emits the illumination light toward an area above the specimen from outside the objective lens in a radial direction, and the top plate is provided with a mark that specifies a viewing-field area of the camera.

Abstract: A laparoscopic surgical method including: observing an interior of an abdominal cavity by using a laparoscope and selecting an optical clearing site to be subjected to optically clearing of fat tissue that covers target tissue; allowing an optical clearing agent to act on the selected optical clearing site; checking visibility of the target tissue through the optical clearing site on which the optical clearing agent has been allowed to act; and treating the target tissue while observing, by using the laparoscope, the target tissue the visibility of which has been checked.

Abstract: A device for sustained release of optical clearing agent includes a stick-shaped component having at least two supplying passages for supplying gas or liquid formed on the inside with apertures of the supplying passages being formed at positions along the circumference of the lateral surface in the vicinity of the top end of the stick-shaped component respectively, at least two pouch-shaped elastic components placed at positions along the circumference of the lateral surface in the vicinity of the top end of the stick-shaped component respectively to cover the apertures of the supplying passages respectively, an optical clearing agent holding component fixed on the surface of one of the pouch-shaped elastic components and holding optical clearing agent, and a body-fluid absorbing component fixed on the surface of another one of the pouch-shaped elastic components and absorbing body fluid flowing from a target object or dehydrating the target object by osmotic pressure.

Abstract: Provided is an observation apparatus including: a housing that has, in a top face thereof, a transmission window on which a container accommodating cells can be placed and through which light can pass; a camera portion that is accommodated in the housing and that captures observation light coming from the cells irradiated with illumination light emitted from an illumination portion and entering the housing by passing through a bottom face of the container and the transmission window of the housing; and a housing-interior heating portion that is accommodated in the housing and that heats the cells.

Abstract: A fat tissue observation method includes: a process A of applying an optical clearing agent to fat tissue within a body; a process B of heating the fat tissue to reduce a first refractive index of the fat tissue and put the first refractive index close to a second refractive index of the optical clearing agent; and a process C of observing an inside of the fat tissue that the optical clearing agent permeates.

Abstract: For the purpose of counting the number of cells within a culture container readily and accurately, a cell analysis device includes a cell-image acquiring unit that acquires an image of cells within a culture container in which the cells are cultured, a usability determining unit that determines whether or not the image acquired by the cell-image acquiring unit is usable, a number-of-cells counting unit that counts the number of cells within the image determined as being usable by the usability determining unit, and a number-of-cells calculating unit that calculates the number of cells within the culture container based on the number of cells counted by the number-of-cells counting unit.

Abstract: A cell analysis apparatus including: a cell image acquisition unit that acquires an image of cells in a culture vessel in which cells are cultured; a smoothing processing unit that smooths luminance values in the image acquired by the cell image acquisition unit; a minimum-value detecting unit that detects minimum values of the luminance values smoothed by the smoothing processing unit; a smallest-minimum-value extracting unit that extracts smallest minimum values which are the smallest in regions according to the sizes of the cells, from the minimum values detected by the minimum-value detecting unit; a counting unit that counts the number of smallest minimum values extracted by the smallest-minimum-value extracting unit; and a cell-count calculating unit that calculates the number of cells in the culture vessel on the basis of the number of smallest minimum values counted by the counting unit.

Abstract: Provided is a biological tissue observation apparatus including an optical fiber probe that receives fluorescence via an input end disposed at one end thereof and that optically guides the fluorescence toward the base end in the longitudinal direction, a photodetector that is disposed facing an output end disposed at the base end of the optical fiber probe and that detects the fluorescence output from the output end, and a scatter suppressing unit provided near the input end of the optical fiber probe.

Abstract: A cell observation information processing system includes: a tag acquiring section that acquires, as a search tag for searching for observation information acquired in response to an acquisition order at one time point, tags containing a cell name, first culture tool identifying information for identifying a culture tool for culturing cells under observation, and second culture tool identifying information for identifying a passage-source culture tool; a storing section that stores in an archive section each piece of the observation information acquired at each time point upon assigning thereto the search tag; a search criterion acquiring section that acquires, as a search criterion, tags containing a cell name and first culture tool identifying information; and a retrieving section that searches through the archive section using the acquired search criterion and retrieves search-tagged observation information on cells having undergone passage of culture from a single cell line over a plurality of generations

Abstract: An observation apparatus is equipped with a housing including a top plate that is a stage on which a container that accommodates a sample is placed; an optical system accommodated in the housing; an imaging device configured to capture an image of the sample with light from the sample that has entered through the stage and the optical system; and a motor that is a power source of a moving mechanism configured to make the optical system move in a direction along the stage. At least one of the imaging device or the motor is placed outside the housing.

Abstract: The system includes a passage presence/absence information acquiring and generating section that acquires or generates previous passage presence/absence information, which indicates whether passage work was conducted or not, at respective previous observation time points at which observation information containing a cell image and activity data were acquired in a time series manner through an observation information acquiring section; and a passage number acquiring and generating section that acquires or generates at least the current passage number at the current observation time point, automatically or through an operation by a user, based on the previous passage presence/absence information acquired or generated by the passage presence/absence information acquiring and generating section, thereby to prevent erroneous input of passage numbers by the user.

Abstract: A cell observation information processing system includes: a tag acquiring section that acquires a tag set for searching for observation information acquired via an acquisition order at one time point; and a storing section that stores into an archive the observation information upon assigning a tag set thereto. The tag acquiring section automatically acquires or generates a possible tag set suggested to be assigned to the observation information as well as accepts an order to change the possible tag set to another tag set from a user, and, if having not received an order to change, acquires the possible tag set as a tag set to be assigned without accepting an input of another tag set by the user, or, if having received an order to change, accepts an input of another tag set by the user and acquires the accepted another tag set as a tag set to be assigned.

Abstract: A cell observation information processing system includes: a tag acquiring section that acquires tags, as search tags for searching for observation information acquired in response to an acquisition order at one time point; a storing section that stores into an archive respective sets of the observation information acquired at respective time points upon assigning to them the search tags; a retrieving section that retrieves a list of tags as possible search tags from the archive; and an output section that outputs the list of tags to a display. For retrieving the list of tags, the retrieving section designates a narrowing-down criterion and narrows down tags to the possible search tags using the narrowing-down criterion. The tag acquiring section acquires a tag selected by the user from the list of tags as displayed. This configuration can save operation effort and time of the user taken to acquire tags.

Abstract: While one beam is being branched into a plurality of beams with different optical path lengths, the beams can be converged on the same position in the optical-axis direction with a simple structure even when relative angles between the beams differ. Provided is a beam splitter apparatus including at least one beam splitter that branches the input pulsed beam into two; at least two light-guide members with different optical path lengths that propagate the pulsed beams branching off via the beam splitter; and a reflection optical system that endows a plurality of pulsed beams emitted from exit ends of the plurality of light-guide members with a relative angle and that converges the plurality of pulsed beams on the same position.

Abstract: A cell observation information processing system includes: a storing section that assigns, to each of observation information sets acquired in response to an acquisition order at each time point to carry an observation result containing a cell image and activity data, search tags including an image tag as a main tag and subordinate tags subordinately associated with the image tag, and stores the search-tagged observation information set into an archive; an image selector; a search criterion generator that searches through the archive using the selected image tag, retrieves a matched search-tagged observation information set, and automatically generates a search criterion based on subordinate tags assigned to the search-tagged observation information set having been retrieved; and a retrieving section that searches through the archive using the search criterion and retrieves data containing activity data in observation information sets to which search tags matched with the search criterion have been assigned.

Abstract: A cell observation information processing system includes: a tag acquiring section that acquires, for searching for observation information acquired at one time point, at least one of search tags including tags respectively indicating user identifying information, cell identifying information, information on maintenance work, apparatus identifying information, activity data variation information, and cell image; a storing section that assigns the search tags acquired by the tag acquiring section to each set of the observation information acquired at each time point and stores into an archive section each set of the search-tagged observation information; a search criterion acquiring section that acquires, as a search criterion, information containing at least one of the search tags assigned to the observation information; and a retrieving section that searches through the archive section using the search criterion and retrieves data containing search-tagged observation information to which search tags matched

Abstract: An device for sustained release of liquid according to the present invention includes: an outer pouch-shaped elastic member 2; an inner pouch-shaped elastic member placed inside the outer pouch-shaped elastic member and capable of being inflated; a liquid-holding section 3 holding liquid between the inner pouch-shaped elastic member and the outer pouch-shaped elastic member; and minute holes provided for the outer pouch-shaped elastic member, the diameter of the minute holes being changed by inflation and deflation.

Abstract: A device for sustained release of optical clearing agent includes a stick-shaped component having at least two supplying passages for supplying gas or liquid formed on the inside with apertures of the supplying passages being formed at positions along the circumference of the lateral surface in the vicinity of the top end of the stick-shaped component respectively, at least two pouch-shaped elastic components placed at positions along the circumference of the lateral surface in the vicinity of the top end of the stick-shaped component respectively to cover the apertures of the supplying passages respectively, an optical clearing agent holding component fixed on the surface of one of the pouch-shaped elastic components and holding optical clearing agent, and a body-fluid absorbing component fixed on the surface of another one of the pouch-shaped elastic components and absorbing body fluid flowing from a target object or dehydrating the target object by osmotic pressure.

Abstract: Provided is an optical device that includes a substrate, a plurality of pillars arrayed on the surface of the substrate at intervals of a pitch that is equal to or less than the wavelength of incident light, and a medium that fills the gaps between the pillars and that has a different refractive index from the pillars. Each of the pillars has one or more steps that discontinuously change the transverse cross-sectional area of the pillar, along the direction perpendicular to the surface of the substrate. The transverse cross-sectional area of at least one of step portions formed by the steps of the pillar differs from the transverse cross-sectional area of an adjacent pillar.

Abstract: While one beam is being branched into a plurality of beams with different optical path lengths, the beams can be converged on the same position in the optical-axis direction with a simple structure even when relative angles between the beams differ. Provided is a beam splitter apparatus including a beam splitter that branches an input pulsed beam into two optical paths with different optical path lengths; relay optical systems that are disposed in the respective branching optical paths and that relay pupils in the optical paths; a beam splitter that multiplexes the relayed pulsed beams in the two optical paths; and a reflection optical system that endows pulsed beams branching off via the beam splitter with a relative angle.