Designing a Computer Software Program for Complex Border Detection. Biological Applications

FIRKA D; RAPACIOLI M; FUENTES F; ORTALLI AL; SANCHEZ V; SCICOLONE G; D'ATTELLIS CE; FLORES V

WSEAS TRANSACTIONS on BIOLOGY and BIOMEDICINE

WSEAS

Lugar: New Jersey; Año: 2004 vol. 1 p. 24 - 29

1109-9518

This paper addresses the problem of detection and characterization of borders of expanding cell populations in histological preparations. A well-known biological model for cellular migration was used: that of the neuronal migration in the developing Central Nervous System (CNS). The software algorithm described here is capable of detecting in an efficient and reproducible way the boundaries of a cell population by simulating a cellular migration, the constraints of which are derived from a microscopic image of an expanding cell population. A space series constructed from the final position of each virtual cell at the end of the simulated cell migration process can be considered as a quantitative representation of the border. Then, the space series is susceptible to analysis as a mathematical function y = f(x) in a cartesian coordinate system. This paper addresses the problem of detection and characterization of borders of expanding cell populations in histological preparations. A well-known biological model for cellular migration was used: that of the neuronal migration in the developing Central Nervous System (CNS). The software algorithm described here is capable of detecting in an efficient and reproducible way the boundaries of a cell population by simulating a cellular migration, the constraints of which are derived from a microscopic image of an expanding cell population. A space series constructed from the final position of each virtual cell at the end of the simulated cell migration process can be considered as a quantitative representation of the border. Then, the space series is susceptible to analysis as a mathematical function y = f(x) in a cartesian coordinate system. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- INDEXED IN: SCOPUS, ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) and INSPEC (Institution of Engineering and Technology, UK)