Garage Scanning Electron Microscope

 

What would you find in the garage of Jeri Ellsworth? Many people would guess a car, but you would be wrong, these days you will find her latest project which is assembling a Scanning Electron Microscope. Even if this system arrived fully functioning it sure doesn’t sound like a project that would be easy to succeed with. Jeri mentions that simply forgetting to close a valve and opening the chamber would caused a 2 week delay before the system could be used while the electron gun chamber got pumped down to a usable pressure. She demonstrates burnt out light bulb filament under the microscope, it is quite amazing the amount of detail that can be seen. I am sure this is an outdated microscope but I am curious what this thing would have cost when it was new.