The Smithsonian report - Research into the Resonance Therapy and Rife Microscope, Rife Research - Europe

The Universal Microscope

It is only a reasonable supposition, but already, in one instance, a very successful and highly commendable achievement on the part of Dr. Royal Raymond Rife of San Diego, California, who, for many years, has built and worked with light microscopes which far surpass the theoretical limitations of the ordinary variety of instrument, all the Rife scopes possessing superior ability to attain high magnification with accompanying high resolution.

The largest and most powerful of these, the Universal Microscope, developed in 1933, consists of 5,682 parts and is so called because of its adaptability in all fields of microscopical work, being fully equipped with separate substage condenser units for transmitted and monochromatic beam dark-field, polarized, and slit-ultra illumination, including also a special device for crystallography. The entire optical system of lenses and prisms as well as the illuminating units are made of block-crystal quartz, quartz being especially transparent to ultraviolet radiations.

This illuminating unit used for examining the filterable forms of disease organisms contains 14 lenses and prisms, 3 of which are in the high-intensity incandescent lamp, 4 in the Risley prism, and 7 in the achromatic condenser which, incidentally, has a numerical aperture of 1.40. Between the source of light and the specimen are subtended two circular, wedge-shaped, block-crystal quartz prisms for the purpose of polarizing the light passing through the specimen, polarization being the practical application of the theory that light waves vibrate in all planes perpendicular to the direction in which they are propagated.

Therefore, when light comes into contact with a polarizing prism, it is divided or split into two beams, one of which is refracted to such an extent that it is reflected to the side of the prism without, of course, passing through the prism while the second ray, bent considerably less, is thus enabled to pass through the prism to illuminate the specimen.

When the quartz prisms on the universal microscope, which may be rotated with vernier control through 360 degrees, are rotated in opposite directions, they serve to bend the transmitted beams of light at variable angles of incidence while, at the same time, a spectrum is projected up into the axis of the microscope, or rather a small portion of the spectrum to the other, going all the way from the infrared to the ultraviolet.

Now, when that portion of the spectrum is reached in which both the organism and the color band vibrate in exact accord, one with the other, a definite characteristic spectrum is emitted by the organism.

In the case of the filter-passing form of the Bacillus Typhosus, for instance, a blue spectrum is emitted and the plane of polarization deviated plus (+) 4.8 degrees.

The predominating chemical constituents of the organism are next ascertained after which the quartz prisms are adjusted or set, by means of vernier control, to minus (-) 4.8 degrees (again in the case of the filter-passing form of the Bacillus Typhosus) so that the opposite angle of refraction may be obtained.

A monochromatic beam of light, corresponding exactly to the frequency of the organism (for Dr. Rife has found that each disease organism responds to and has a definite wave length, a fact confirmed by British medical research workers) is then sent up through the specimen and the direct transmitted light, thus enabling the observer to view the organism stained in its true chemical color and revealing its own individual structure in a field which is brilliant with light.

The objectives used on the universal microscope are a 1.12 dry lens, a 1.16 water immersion, a 1.18 oil immersion, and a 1.25 oil immersion. The rays of light refracted by the specimen enter the objective and are then carried up the tube in parallel rays through 21 light bends to the ocular, a tolerance of less than one wave length of visible light only being permitted in the core beam, or chief ray, of illumination.

Now, instead of the light rays starting up the tube in a parallel fashion, tending to converge as they rise higher and finally crossing each other, arriving at the ocular separated by considerable distance as would be the case with an ordinary microscope, in the universal tube the rays also start their rise parallel to each other but, just as they are about to pull them out parallel again, another prism being inserted each time the rays are about ready to cross.

These prisms, inserted in the tube, which are adjusted and held in alignment by micrometer screws of 100 threads to the inch in special tracks made of magnelium (magnelium having the closest coefficient of expansion of any metal to quartz), are separated by a distance of only 30 millimeters.

Thus, the greatest distance that the image in the universal microscope is projected through any one media, either quarz or air, is 30 millimeters instead of the 160, 180, or 190 millimeters as in the empty or air-filled tubes of an ordinary microscope, the total distance which the light rays travel zigzag fashion through the universal tube being 449 millimeters, although the physical length of the tube itself is 229 millimeters.

It will be recalled that if one pierces a black strip of paper or cardboard with the point of a needle and then brings the card up close to the eye so that the hole is in the optic axis, a small brilliantly lighted object will appear larger and clearer, revealing more fine detail, than if it were viewed from the same distance without the assistance of the card.

This is explained by the fact that the beam of light passing through the card is very narrow, the rays entering the eye, therefore, being practically parallel, whereas without the card the beam of light is much wider and the diffusion circles much larger. It is this principle of parallel rays in the universal microscope and the resultant shortening of projection distance between any two blocks or prisms plus the fact that objectives can thus be substituted for oculars, these "oculars" being three matched pairs of 10 millimeter, 7 millimeter, and 4 millimeter objectives in short mounts, which would make possible not only the unusually high magnification and resolution but which serve to eliminate all distortion as well as all chromatic and spherical aberration.

Quartz slides with especially thin quartz cover glasses are used when a tissue section or culture slant is examined, the tissue section itself also being very thin. An additional observational tube and ocular which yield a magnification of 1,800 diameters are provided so that that portion of the specimen which is desired to be examined may be located so that the observer can adjust himself more readily when viewing a section at a high magnification.

The universal stage is a double rotating stage graduated through 360 degrees in quarter-minute arc divisions, the upper segment carrying the mechanical stage having a movement of 40 degrees, plus or minus. Heavily constructed joints and screw adjustments maintain rigidity of the microscope which weighs 200 pounds and stands 24 inches high, the bases of the scope being nickel cast-steel plates, accurately surfaced, and equipped with three leveling screws and two spirit levels set at angles of 90 degrees. The coarse adjustment, a block thread screw with 40 threads to the inch, slides in a 1 1/2 dovetail which gibes directly onto the pillar post.The weight of the quadruple nosepiece and the objective system is taken care of by the intermediate adjustment at the top of the body tube. The stage, in conjunction with a hydraulic lift, acts as a lever in operating the fine adjustment. A 6-gauge screw having 100 threads to the inch is worked through a gland into a hollow, glycerine-filled post, the glycerine being displaced and replaced at will as the screw is turned clockwise or anticlockwise, allowing a 5-to-1 ratio on the lead screw. This, accordingly, assures complete absence of drag and inertia. The fine adjustment being 700 times more sensitive then that of ordinary microscopes, the length of time required to focus the universal ranges up to 1 1/2 hours which, while on first consideration, may seem a disadvantage, is after all but a slight inconvenience when compared with the many years of research and the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent and being spent in an effort to isolate and to look upon disease-causing organisms in their true form.

Working together back in 1931 and using one of the smaller Rife microscope having a magnification and resolution of 17,000 diameters, Dr. Rife and Dr. Arthur Isaac Kendall, of the department of bacteriology of Northwestern University Medical School, were able to observe and demonstrate the presence of the filter-passing forms of Bacillus Typhosus. An agar slant culture of the Rawlings strain of Bacillus Typhosus was first prepared by Dr. Kendall and inoculated into 6 cc of "Kendall" K Medium, a medium rich in protein but poor in peptone and consisting of 100 mg.of dried hog intestine and 6 cc of tyrode solution (containing neither glucose nor glycerine) which mixture is shaken well so as to moisten the dried intestine powder and then sterilized in the autoclave, 15 pounds for 15 minutes, alterations of the medium being frequently necessary depending upon the requirements for different organisms. Now, after a period of 18 hours in this K Medium, the culture was passed through a Berkefeld "N" filter, a drop of the filtrate being added to another 6 cc. of K Medium and incubated at 37 degrees C. Forty-eight hours later this same process was repeated, the "N" filter again being used, after which it was noted that the culture no longer responded to peptone medium, growing now only in the protein medium. When again, within 24 hours, the culture was passed through a filter-the finest Berkefeld "W" filter, a drop of the filtrate was once more added to 6 cc.of K Medium and incubated at 37 degrees c., a period of 3 days elapsing before a new culture was transferred to K Medium and yet another 3 days before a new culture was prepared. Then, viewed under an ordinary microscope, these cultures were observed to be turbid and to reveal no bacilli whatsoever. When viewed by means of dark-field illumination and oil-immersion lens, however, the presence of small, actively motile granules was established, although nothing at all of their individual structure could be ascertained. Another period of 4 days was allowed to elapse before these cultures were transferred to K Medium and incubated at 37 degrees C for 24 hours when they were then examined under the Rife microscope where, as was mentioned earlier, the filterable typhoid bacilli, emitting a blue spectrum, caused the plane of polarization to be deviated plus 4.8 degrees. Then when the opposite angle of refraction was obtained by means of adjusting the polarizing prisms to minus 4.8 degrees and the cultures illuminated by a monochromatic beam coordinated in frequency with the chemical constituents of the typhoid bacillus, small oval actively motile, bright turquoise-blue bodies were observed at a magnificatinn of 5,000 diameters, in high contrast to the colorless and motionless debris of the medium. These observations were repeated eight times, the complete absence of these bodies in uninoculated control K Media also being noted.

To further confirm their findings, Drs. Rife and Kendall next examined 18-hour-old cultures which had been inoculated into K Medium and incubated at 37 degrees C., since it is just at this stage of growth in this medium and at this temperature that the cultures become filterable. And, just as had been anticipated, ordinary dark-field examination revealed unchanged, long, actively motile bacilli; bacilli having granules within their substance; and free-swimming, actively motile granules; while under the Rife microscope were demonstrated the same long, unchanged, almost colorless bacilli; bacilli, practically colorless, inside and at one end of which was a turquoise-blue granule resembling the filterable forms of the typhoid bacillus; and free-swimming, small, oval, actively motile,turquoise-blue granules. By transplanting the cultures of the filter-passing organisms or virus into a broth, they were seen to change over again into their original rodlike forms.

At the same time that these findings of Drs. Rife and Kendall were confirmed by Dr. Edward C. Rosenow, of the Mayo Foundation, the magnification with accompanying resolution of 8,000 diameters of the Rife microscope, operated by Dr. Rife, was checked against a dark-field oil-immersion scope operated by Dr. Kendall and an ordinary 2-mm. oil-immersion objective, x 10 ocular, Zeiss scope operated by Dr.Rosenow at a magnification of 900 diameters. Examinations of gram and safranin-stained films of culture of Bacillus typhosus, gram and safranin-stained films of blood and of the sediment of the spinal fluid from a case of acute poliomyelitis were made with the result that bacilli, streptococci, erythrocytes, polymorphonuclear leukocytes, and lymphocytes measuring nine times the diameter of the same specimens observed under the Zeiss scope at a magnification and resolution of 900 diameters, were revealed with unusual clarity. Seen under the dark-field microscope were moving bodies presumed to be the filterable turquois-blue bodies of the typhoid bacillus which, as Dr.Rosenow has declared in his report (Observations on filter-passing forms of Eberthella-typhi-Bacillus typhosus - and of the streptococcus from poliomyelitis, Proc.Staff Meeting Mayo Clinic, July 13, 1932), were so "unmistakably demonstrated" with Rife microscope, while under the Zeiss scope stained and hanging-drop preparations of clouded filtrate culture were found to be uniformly negative. With the Rife microscope also were demonstrated brownish-gray cocci and diplococci in hanging-drop preparations of the filtrates of streptococcus from poliomyelitis. These cocci and diplococci, similar in size and shape to those seen in the culture although of more uniform intensity, and characteristic of the medium in which they had been cultivated, were surrounded by a clear halo about twice the width of that at the margins of the debris and of the Bacillus typhosus. Stained films of filtrates and filtrate sediments examined under the Zeiss microscope, and hanging-drop, dark-field preparations revealed no organisms, however. Brownish-gray cocci and diplococci of the exact same size and density as those observed in the filtrates of the streptococcus cultures were also revealed in hanging-drop preparations of the virus of poliomyelitis underthe Rife microscope, while no organisms at all could be seen in either the stained films of filtrates and filtrate sediments examined with the Zeiss scope or in hanging-drop preparations examined by means of the dark-field. Again using the Rife microscope at a magnification of 8,000 diameters, numerous nonmotile cocci and diplococci of a bright-to-pale pink in color were seen in hanging-drop preparations of filtrates of Herpes encephalitic virus. Although these were observed to be comparatively smaller then the cocci and diplococci of the streptococcus and poliomyelitis viruses, they were shown to be of fairly even density, size and form and surrounded by a halo. Again, both the dark-field and Zeiss scopes failed to reveal any organisms, and none of the three microscopes disclosed the presence of such diplococci in hanging-drop preparation of the filtrate of a normal rabbit brain. Dr. Rosenow has since revealed these organisms with the ordinary microscope at a magnification of 1,000 diameters by means of his special staining method and with the electron microscope at a magnification of 12,000 diameters. Dr. Rosenow has expressed the opinion that the inability to see these and other similarly revealed organisms is due, not necessarily to the minuteness of the organisms, but rather to the fact that they are of a nonstaining, hyaline structure. Results with the Rife microscopes, he thinks, are due to the "ingenious methods employed rather than to excessively high magnification." He has declared also, in the report mentioned previously, that "Examination under the Rife microscope of specimens containing objects visible with the ordinary microscope, leaves no doubt of the accurate visualization of objects or particulate matter by direct observation at the extremely high magnification obtained with this instrument."

Exceedingly high powers of magnification with accompanying high powers of resolution may be realized with all of the Rife microscopes, one of which, having magnification and resolution up to 18,000 diameters, is now being used at the British School of Tropical Medicine in England. In a recent demonstration of another of the smaller Rife scopes (May 16, 1942) before a group of doctors including Dr. J.H. Renner, of Santa Barbara, Calif.; Dr. Roger A. Schmidt, of San Francisco, Calif.; Dr. Lois Bronson Slade, of Alameda, Calif.; Dr. Lucile B. Larkin, of Bellingham, Wash.; Dr. E. F. Larkin, of Bellingham, Wash.; and Dr. W. J. Gier, of San Diego, Calif., a Zeiss ruled grading was examined, first under an ordinary commercial microscope equipped with a 1.8 high dry lens and X 10 ocular, and then under the Rife microscope. Whereas 50 lines were revealed with the commercial instrument and considerable aberration, both chromatic and spherical noted, only 5 lines were seen with the Rife scope, these 5 lines being so highly magnified that they occupied the entire field, without any aberration whatsoever being apparent. Dr. Renner, in a discussion of his observations, stated that "The entire field to its very edges and across the center had a uniform clearness that was not true on the conventional instrument." Following the examination of the grading, an ordinary unstained blood film was observed under the same two microscopes. In this instance, 100 cells were seen to spread throughout the field of the commercial instrument while but 10 cells filled the field of the Rife scope.