Jules Wyman

I found this flat-backed millipede (order Polydesmida) specimen while walking around the Stanford campus at night after a strong winter shower. I removed a small piece of the exoskeleton cuticle, and examined it with my foldscope while shining an ultraviolet light, which produced the iridescent blue seen in the iPhone image. β-carboline has been identified as a compound involved with producing this stunning fluorescence.

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Millipede Cuticle under Ultraviolet Light

The other night, I asked a good friend if she wanted to go help me look for something outside to examine with the foldscope. But, dreading the blistering cold of the recent nights, we first decided to see if we could find anything interesting indoors, and our search resulted in one my favorite images I have captured with the foldscope.


 Depicted is my what I believe to be part of one (multiple?) squamous epithelial cell from a swab of the inside of my friend’s cheek. Based on online research, I think that the rotund region slightly left of center could be the nucleus of an epithelial cell, but I would love to hear any other input on whether this is the case. My thinking is that because the foldscope lens is 140x magnification, and the pictures that I see online of cheek cells at 100x depict a few cells, my image could be of parts of a few cells with ill-defined boundaries, but I am really not sure. Either way, I think this photo turned out very neat, and would love to learn more about its contents!

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Jules Wyman

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Millipede Cuticle under Ultraviolet Light

Squamous Epithelial Cell (Bio 60)

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Foldscope Lens Magnification