title: CellAging: a tool to study segregation and partitioning in division in cell lineages of Escherichia coli.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Cell division in Escherichia coli is morphologically symmetric. However, as unwanted protein aggregates are segregated to the cell poles and, after divisions, accumulate at older poles, generate asymmetries in sister cells' vitality. Novel single-molecule detection techniques allow observing aging-related processes in vivo, over multiple generations, informing on the underlying mechanisms.
  
  
  RESULTS
  CellAging is a tool to automatically extract information on polar segregation and partitioning in division of aggregates in E.coli, and on cellular vitality. From time-lapse, parallel brightfield and fluorescence microscopy images, it performs cell segmentation, alignment of brightfield and fluorescence images, lineage construction and pole age determination, and it computes aging-related features. We exemplify its use by analyzing spatial distributions of fluorescent protein aggregates from images of cells across generations.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  CellAging, instructions and an example are available at http://www.cs.tut.fi/%7esanchesr/cellaging/.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
authors.affiliation: Department of Signal Processing, Tampere University of Technology, 33101 Tampere, Finland.
authors.forename: Antti
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Häkkinen
authors.forename: Anantha-Barathi
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Muthukrishnan
authors.forename: Andre
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mora
authors.forename: Jose M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Fonseca
authors.forename: Andre S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Ribeiro
mesh_terms: D002455:Cell Division; D019070:Cell Lineage; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000166:cytology*; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D008164:Luminescent Proteins / Q000032:analysis; D012984:Software
chemical_list: D008164:Luminescent Proteins