Guide/Miniscope V4 part procurement

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Guide · 21 May 2026
By Daniel Aharoni
Intro guide on how to purchase V4 Miniscopes and Miniscope components.
Format: Tutorial
Audience: Beginner
Review status
Last reviewed 2026-07-22
Reviewer User:DAharoni
Next review due 2027-07-22
Review interval 12 months
Review history
  • 2026-07-22 — User:DAharoni — Passed


In this repository we have included everything you need to source, fabricate, and assemble a V4 Miniscope however you choose. Much of the system can be built from off-the-shelf commercial components, but it also requires custom Miniscope body parts and a custom Rigid-Flex PCB.

This guide covers both paths:

A Note on the Open-Source Nature of the Miniscope Project: With the Miniscope project being an open-source project, any person, group, or company has the option of putting together and selling any part of this system. While this has generally resulted in mostly well-put-together parts and systems for previous Miniscopes released, there is always the risk that some groups/companies will supply less-than-adequate components/systems. We try to work with open-source distribution groups and commercial companies interested in distributing parts of our system to make sure the work/support/systems they provide are up to the standards the neuroscience community expects. Below, we try to list as many avenues as possible for getting quality components for Miniscopes. If you know of, or have questions about, other sources of components/systems, feel free to ask us about them on the Miniscope Discussion Forum.

Buying assembled Miniscopes, kits, DAQs & accessories

This section covers three things you can purchase online: Miniscope DAQs, Miniscope Assembly Kits and fully assembled Miniscopes, and other Miniscope accessories.

Note: Currently, we suggest researchers use OEPS to purchase everything they need for Miniscope experiments. The Miniscope team has worked closely with the Open Ephys Production Site (OEPS) since 2019 to develop a road-map for what we think will be the future of open-source tool development, dissemination, and distribution. OEPS is strongly committed to advancing open-source tools and helping the global neuroscience community. Additionally, OEPS stands behind all the items on their site with warranties and support. Below, we provide all purchasing options currently known to us, but if you are interested in supporting the Miniscope project and, more broadly, continued open-source tool development/distribution, we highly suggest you consider the OEPS purchasing options.

If you need just some of the individual machined components (housings, baseplates), you should also check out MiniscopeParts.com. The Miniscope Team has worked closely with the machinist who runs the site since the beginning of the Miniscope Project, and everything sold on the site has been validated by us and is compatible with OEPS devices. The machinist does a lot of pro bono prototyping work for the Miniscope project, so purchasing items from this site also supports the Miniscope project.

Miniscope DAQs

You will need a Miniscope Data Acquisition (DAQ) Box to connect your Miniscope to your computer. The V4 Miniscope will work seamlessly with all previous generations of Miniscope DAQs. So if your lab has already been using Miniscopes, there is no need to purchase new DAQs unless you need more of them.

OEPS Miniscope DAQ
  • OEPS's Miniscope DAQ [Validated by the Miniscope and NINscope Projects]: This Miniscope DAQ supports the previous-generation Miniscope (V3.x), the current-generation Miniscope (V4), and the open-source NINscope developed by the Hoogland Lab. OEPS's DAQ includes a programmed and tested DAQ PCB along with a housing for it. This is our preferred Miniscope DAQ if you need one. It includes the following features over earlier Miniscope DAQ revisions:
    • Doubled, future-proof internal memory
    • Access to one additional IO
    • 5V-tolerant digital inputs, which means you can connect directly to an Arduino or a 5V TTL signal
    • Layout designed to be directly compatible with NINscope
OEPS also carries some Miniscope DAQ Accessories, but these are not required for the Miniscope system to be functional.
LabMaker Miniscope V4 DAQ PCB
  • LabMaker's Miniscope V4 DAQ PCB [Validated by the Miniscope Project]: All of the Miniscope DAQ PCBs listed on the LabMaker site should be functionally equivalent, but the "Miniscope V4 – DAQ PCB" comes pre-programmed to run the V4 Miniscope. This DAQ PCB is based off the Miniscope DAQ v3.2. If you want a housing for it, you can 3D print one yourself or get one printed here.

Miniscope Assembly Kits and fully assembled Miniscopes

The V4 Miniscope can be purchased as a fully assembled system or as an Assembly Kit. We prefer the V4 Miniscope Assembly Kit option over fully assembled options, as we feel the process of building a Miniscope yourself is extremely valuable. It helps you understand what goes into the Miniscope, gives you confidence that it won't break (and if it does, you can fix it), and might even spur some ideas for modifying your Miniscope to best fit your experiments.

Miniscope Assembly Kits

OEPS Miniscope V4 Assembly Kit
  • OEPS's Miniscope V4 Assembly Kit [Validated by the Miniscope Project]: This kit includes everything you need to assemble a fully functional V4 Miniscope. It is important to note that you will still need to order the coax cable, baseplates, and a DAQ separately. This Assembly Kit is our preferred recommendation for labs to get up and running with the V4 Miniscope. While it will take time to build a V4 Miniscope yourself (just under a day for your first time, and under an hour once you know what you are doing), we feel the experience and knowledge you gain more than make up for the time you put in.
  • LabMaker's Miniscope V4 Assembly Kit: This kit should include everything you need to assemble a fully functional V4 Miniscope. It has not been validated or tested by the Miniscope Team.

Fully assembled Miniscopes

Fully assembled V4 Miniscope

Miniscope accessories

Baseplates

All the Miniscope V4 Baseplates listed below are the Variant 2 version of the baseplate. If you are getting Miniscope parts from any of the links above, then you will always be using the Variant 2 baseplate. This version is compatible with V4 Miniscopes that have an aluminum sleeve around the bottom portion of the Miniscope.

OEPS Miniscope V4 Baseplates

Coax cable

OEPS Coax Cable Assembly Kit

Sourcing individual components

This section is for users who want to procure V4 Miniscope components individually rather than buying an assembly kit or fully assembled Miniscope. By the time you reach the end of this section, you will have ordered or purchased everything needed to assemble and use a V4 Miniscope.

Computer

Requirements and suggestions:

  • Currently the Miniscope DAQ Software runs on Windows and Linux. The software has been written in QT and uses OpenCV, and therefore can likely be built for other operating systems without too much effort.
  • Requires a USB3 port.
  • The number of cores/threads needed to run the Miniscope Software will depend on the number of devices you plan on streaming data from and the data compression you plan on using. For light loads, a mid-priced laptop or better should be fine.
  • In the past we generally used MacBook Pros running Windows through Boot Camp for Miniscope acquisition, but we have noticed that a specific configuration of Boot Camp + Windows does not play well with the Miniscope DAQ Software. We therefore suggest currently staying away from Macs running Windows.
  • If you do not need portability, a standard desktop should be able to handle the Miniscope Software without issue.

Miniscope DAQ PCB/Box

A Miniscope connects to a computer through a Miniscope DAQ PCB/Box. The V4 Miniscope uses the released Miniscope DAQ (Version 3.x family). This means that if your lab currently uses Miniscopes, you just need to upload new Miniscope DAQ Firmware to the DAQ to enable V4 Miniscope support.

The GitHub repo for the Miniscope DAQ v3.2 can be found here. This is only needed if you plan on fabricating, assembling, or modifying the DAQ yourself.

Most users do not need to modify the DAQ and would prefer to directly purchase an assembled, programmed, and tested Miniscope DAQ. See Miniscope DAQs above for the OEPS and LabMaker purchasing options. If you buy the assembled-and-tested DAQ PCB from LabMaker without a housing, one place to get a 3D-printed DAQ box is here.

Rigid-Flex PCB

The Rigid-Flex PCB of the V4 Miniscope is the most difficult item to source for the system. This repository contains the KiCad design files, gerbers, BOM, and pick-and-place files if you want to get the Rigid-Flex PCB fabricated and assembled yourself.

Miniscope body parts

The Miniscope body is composed of:

Quantity Part Name Material
1 Objective Module Delrin
1 Emission Module Delrin
1 Excitation Module Delrin
1 Objective Module Sleeve (optional) Aluminum

In addition, you will need V4 Miniscope base plates for mounting the Miniscope to the animal's skull. There are two variants of the base plate; one requires an aluminum Objective Module Sleeve.

Quantity Part Name (you need one of the two variants below) Material
1 Miniscope V4 Base Plate Variant 1 Aluminum
1 Miniscope V4 Base Plate Variant 2 (used in conjunction with the Objective Module Sleeve) Aluminum

Fusion and .STL files are included in this repository. If you get these machined yourself, you need to make sure the fit of the 3 mm and 4 mm lenses is a press-fit. You also need to make sure the base plate fit is a slip-fit.

We recommend getting these parts machined by Shylo Stiteler (shylostiteler@gmail.com), as he is very familiar with the Miniscope project, understands the fit-and-finish requirements, and produces exceptional parts. He has set up a Miniscope Parts web store where you can purchase individual machined parts.

3D-printing options: We recommend getting these parts machined out of Delrin and aluminum, but we have also had decent success 3D printing them on a Formlabs Form3 printer using their black resin. The main downsides are that the parts are more brittle and less flexible than Delrin, slightly poorer at blocking light, and less rigid than machined aluminum.

Glass lenses

We have tested the V4 Miniscope using lenses from Edmund Optics. Below is the standard optical stack for the V4 Miniscope. It will result in a ~1 mm field-of-view diameter and ~1 mm working distance. For other lens stack options, visit the Lens Configurations page.

Quantity Vendor Part Number Description
2 Edmund Optics 45-089 3 mm diameter, 6 mm FL achromat used in the objective module
1 Edmund Optics 63-691 4 mm diameter, 10 mm FL achromat used in the emission module
1 Edmund Optics 47-269 3.0 mm diameter, N-BK7 half-ball lens

Electrowetting lens

To adjust the focus on the Miniscope from software, the V4 Miniscope uses an electrowetting lens from Corning/Varioptic. For largish quantities (20+), you can contact Varioptic directly and request part number "A-25H0".

For smaller quantities, the electrowetting lens can be purchased directly from Edmund Optics:

Quantity Vendor Part Number Description
1 Edmund Optics 34-282 2.5 mm CA, A-25H0 Corning Varioptic variable-focus liquid lens

If you purchase the electrowetting lens from Edmund Optics, you will need to remove the metal housing and flex printed circuit it comes with. This can easily be done with common tools available in most neuroscience labs.

Optical filters

You will need 3 optical filters for the V4 Miniscope. These are standard GCaMP/GFP filters, but they need to be diced to a small, custom size. We recommend getting these filters from Chroma, as they are very familiar with the Miniscope project and often keep these custom-diced filters in stock. You can also ask Chroma to dice most of the filters they sell if you want to image other wavelengths.

Quantity Vendor Part Number Description
1 Chroma ET470/40x 4 mm × 4 mm × 1 mm excitation filter. Make sure to specify this size (or say it is for the V4 Miniscope) in the request.
1 Chroma ET525/50m 4 mm × 4 mm × 1 mm emission filter. Make sure to specify this size (or say it is for the V4 Miniscope) in the request.
1 Chroma T495lpxr 6 mm × 4 mm × 1 mm dichroic filter. Make sure to specify this size (or say it is for the V4 Miniscope) in the request.

Contact Dick Stewart (dstewart@chroma.com) to get a quote from Chroma.

Coaxial cable and connectors

Any 50 Ω coaxial cable will work with the Miniscope system, but we recommend using a thin, flexible coax cable. It is also important to note that the thinner the coax cable, the shorter the maximum cable length can be. This is due to two things: thinner cables have a higher resistivity, which causes a larger voltage drop across the cable, and thinner cables have more signal attenuation at high frequencies.

Quantity Vendor Part Number Description
~10 ft Cooner Wire CW2040-3650SR Our recommended coax cable. It is 1.1 mm in diameter and both strong and flexible.
~5 ft Mouser 538-50MCX-37 An extremely thin coax cable. Generally it will work up to about 5 ft in length.

Screws and glue/epoxy

The Miniscope uses M1 thread-forming screws for assembly. We recommend part number 96817A704 from McMaster-Carr. You can use a [T2 Torx driver to screw and unscrew these M1 screws; we use part number 52995A24 from McMaster-Carr for this.

We glue/epoxy the Rigid-Flex PCB onto the Miniscope. While modifications can be made to mount the Rigid-Flex PCB with screws and/or brackets, glue/epoxy has worked well for us — it can completely seal the image sensor area and can also be removed if replacing or repairing parts is needed. Generally try to avoid using cyanoacrylate glues (super glues), as they can cause plastics to become brittle and out-gas a hazy coating over optical surfaces. That said, Loctite 444 has worked well as long as it is allowed to cure in an open space for a few days. We suggest the following (loosely ordered by our preference):

  • Gorilla 2-Part Epoxy, 5-minute set (or similar)
  • UV-curable optical glue (Norland 68)
  • PCB potting epoxy
  • 2-part general-purpose epoxies
  • Loctite 444 with compatible accelerator
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