Question

What is the best microscope to get a detailed view of the parts inside of a preserved plant cell?

Answer 1

Depends on what parts you want to look at... and what level of detail you want.

Answer 2

Calliope is right: technically it depends on what you would like to look at and what level of structure (i.e., proteins and molecules or bigger cellular structures) you would like to look at.

Because the question specifies a plant cell, I would recommend using a compound microscope. Magnifications on most compound scopes range from 10x to 60x. At the low end of the scale you can see how many plant cells fit together and are arranged into tissues; at the high end you can get quite a good view of structures like choloroplasts and vacuoles inside the cell.

Hope this helps.

Answer 3

I would like to add that there are some basic structures that you are very unlikely to see with a light microscope, including some that you've probably learned about in class or seen on diagrams. Ribosomes, for example, or the ER, or mitochondria.

You can, however, get a pretty good view of some of the bigger structures, especially since preserved specimens are usually stained quite nicely.

For the smaller details, you'd need an electron microscope, either scanning or transmission, depending, again, on what you actually want to look at.