7. How could you test to see if your specimen will grow, and how does that relate to cell theory?

The Cell Theory

Virtually all cells are too small to be seen with the unaided eye. Human vision is not powerful enough to resolve objects closer together than 100 micrometers, and since most cells are about this size they cannot normally be seen without some sort of magnification.

The father and son eyeglass makers Hans and Zacharias Janssen are generally credited with the discovery that, if two lenses are placed in a line with one another, then the light passing through them will be bent and the image of an object will be magnified. This discovery, made at the end of the sixteenth century, soon led to the production of the first simple microscopes.

These instruments consisted of little more than two lenses fitted inside a