Freely Available Tool for Automated Quantification of Stained Cells Microscopy Images.

DIEGO MASONE; ALDANA GOJANOVICH; YESICA R. FRONTINI LÓPEZ; SAMANTA DEL VÉLIZ; MARINA UHART; DIEGO M. BUSTOS

Mendoza

Congreso; XXXIV Reunión Científica Anual de la Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo; 2016

Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo

The analysis of microscopy images is a powerful research tool, especially if it is quantitative and automatic. Accurate quantification of colored structures in stained cells is a routine task for cellular biologists. User dependent image manipulation steps are the most common error source in many quantification tools. Others require expensive software or have been developed for unstained cellular structures, which often leads to over- or sub- estimation. Here, we aimed at developing a freely available tool for automated quantification of colored structures in cells. We used Oil Red Ostained lipid droplets ?and DAPI stained nuclei- of murine 3T3-L1preadipocytes and human mesenchymal stem cells undergoing adipogenesis as models to develop our algorithm. We generated a fully automatic algorithm capable of analyzing hundreds of images and ofquantifying cells of different origins, nuclei, lipid droplets or other structures using the freely available Octave package. Our method can be used on either standard light microscopy or fluorescent images, to extract a bulk of biologically relevant information. Prospectively, the quantification method described in this work could be applied to static or time-lapse data, collected with a simple visible light or fluorescence microscopy equipment. Also, it is perfectly applicable to screenings to elucidate the functions of genes at systems level by investigating the phenotypes of a large number of cells in culture. The algorithm and/or technical support/collaboration are provided under request.p { margin-bottom: 0.25cm; line-height: 115% }