Automatic tracking of labeled red blood cells in microchannels.
The current study proposes an automatic method for the segmentation and tracking of red blood cells flowing through a 100- μm glass capillary. The original images were obtained by means of a confocal system and then processed in MATLAB using the Image Processing Toolbox. The measurements obtained with the proposed automatic method were compared with the results determined by a manual tracking method. The comparison was performed by using both linear regressions and Bland-Altman analysis. The results have shown a good agreement between the two methods. Therefore, the proposed automatic method is a powerful way to provide rapid and accurate measurements for in vitro blood experiments in microchannels.
Institute Polytechnic of Bragança, Portugal; FEUP, Porto University, Portugal.
Diana
D
Pinho
Rui
R
Lima
Ana I
AI
Pereira
Fernando
F
Gayubo
D000328:Adult; D000465:Algorithms; D058948:Cell Tracking / Q000379:methods*; D004912:Erythrocytes / Q000166:cytology*; D005456:Fluorescent Dyes / Q000737:chemistry; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D016014:Linear Models; D018613:Microscopy, Confocal / Q000379:methods; D055616:Microtechnology / Q000295:instrumentation*; D008954:Models, Biological
D005456:Fluorescent Dyes
automatic method; image analysis; in vitro blood flow; microchannels; microcirculation; red blood cells