Dissecting microscope is a low power microscope designed to get magnification and conduct examination of three dimensional objects. It is unlike other lab microscopes that are used to examine samples on slides. The design is sometimes referred to as the stereoscope due to the way in which the lenses operate. As the name suggests, dissecting microscopes are generally used in the dissection of specimens.
Contrary to a compound microscope, which is suitable for getting a very high level of magnification for two dimensional objects through a single lens, a dissecting microscope has two lens arrays aligned in such a way that provides a stereoscopic or three dimensional image. This allows the observers to clearly view a three dimensional object on the stage of the microscope.