Comparison between CSU and confocal

Comparison between CSU and other confocal systems

	CSU	Conventional Point-scan Confocal	Conventional Slit-scan Confocal	Other spinning disk Confocal	Epifluorescence (Wide field)
Scan Type	Microlens-enhanced multi beam scan	Single beam scan	Line Scan	Disk scan (Multi beam or slit)	None
Light Source	Lasers	Lasers	Lasers	Hg or Xenon arc lamp	Hg or Xenon arc lamp
Detector	CCD, EMCCD	PMT	Line CCD	CCD, EMCCD	CCD,EMCCD
Microscope	Flexible	Specific	Specific	Flexible / Specific	Flexible
Scan speed of full-size image	2000fps*¹	~1fps	~120fps (512X512)	<200fps	ANY
Photo bleaching/photo toxicity	Low	Severe	Severe	Low	Low
Confocality	High (X-Y-Z confocal)	High (X-Y-Z confocal)	Modest (Compromise y-resolution)	Modest (X-Y-Z confocal with pinhole, Compromise y-resolution with slit-scan)	None
Image acquisition	Acquire entire field Simultaneously	Point-by-point	Line-by-line	Acquire entire field Simultaneously	Acquire entire field Simultaneously
3D Image acquisition	Very fast (1 Voxel(30 ful size slice images)/sec)<	Very slow (1section/sec)	Modest	Modest	None
Image Quality (Background)	High Good S/N (Low background)	High (multiple averaging necessary)	Modest	Modest (High background with dim samples)	Low (High background)
*1 CSU-X1 High-end model