Common computers are morphing into powerful microscopes at UQ as the University trials virtual microscopes and unveils a plan to build a national repository of virtual veterinary slides.

Virtual microscopes, created by UQ's Schools of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering (ITEE) and Veterinary Science, are computers with special software that do the job of high-end laboratory microscopes.

Project leader and UQ Vet School senior lecturer Dr Paul Mills said virtual microscopes were accurate and users could zoom in or out, view depths of field, label their slides and rotate them like a three-dimensional image. ...