M. Leyser
fl. 1850 - 1880
Leyser was the mechanician of the University of Leipzig. In 1870 he collaborated with Dr. Alexander Brandt in the design of a new form of microtome. According to Charles Sedgewick Minot in 1903:
"In 1870 Alexander Brandt, who afterwards became a distinguished zoologist, was working in the zoological laboratory of Prof. Leuckart at Leipzig, where they were then using the Rivet microtome. The unsatisfactory results obtained with the wooden model led Dr. Brandt to have made by Leyser, the mechanician of the university, the microtome which was long and widely known by the name of Leyser.... Its construction constituted a great step forward. The essential addition by the Rivet type to what we had before had was the substitution of the mechanical motion of the knife for the free-hand motion, so that both object and knife were moved mechanically and therefore with comparative precision. Perhaps the principal reason why this microtome gained favor so rapidly is to be found in the fact that just before its introduction the embedding of objects in paraffine had been introduced, and the microtome was used chiefly for paraffine sections."
"In 1870 Alexander Brandt, who afterwards became a distinguished zoologist, was working in the zoological laboratory of Prof. Leuckart at Leipzig, where they were then using the Rivet microtome. The unsatisfactory results obtained with the wooden model led Dr. Brandt to have made by Leyser, the mechanician of the university, the microtome which was long and widely known by the name of Leyser.... Its construction constituted a great step forward. The essential addition by the Rivet type to what we had before had was the substitution of the mechanical motion of the knife for the free-hand motion, so that both object and knife were moved mechanically and therefore with comparative precision. Perhaps the principal reason why this microtome gained favor so rapidly is to be found in the fact that just before its introduction the embedding of objects in paraffine had been introduced, and the microtome was used chiefly for paraffine sections."