Timeline of microscope technology

1590 - Dutch spectacle-makers,Hans Janssen and his son Zacharias Janssen, claimed by later writers (Pierre Borel 1620 - 1671 or 1628 - 1689 and Willem Boreel 1591 - 1668) to have invented a compound microscope.
1609 - Galileo Galilei develops an occhiolino or compound microscope with a convex and a concave lens.
1612 - Galileo presents occhiolino to Polish king Sigismund III.Faber of Bamberg (1574 - 1629) of the Linceans coins the word microscope by analogy with telescope..his invention of the phase contrast optical microscope.
1981 - Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer develop the scanning tunneling microscope.