Title: An automatic real-time system for the determination of translational and rotational speeds of swimming micro-organisms

Authors: Primo Coltelli, Mauro Evangelisti, Valter Evangelista, Paolo Gualtieri

Addresses: Istituto di Scienza e Tecnologie dell'Informazione 'A. Faedo', Area della Ricerca CNR, Via Moruzzi 1, 56124 Pisa, Italy. ' Istituto di Biofisica, Area della Ricerca CNR, Via Moruzzi 1, 56124 Pisa, Italy. ' Istituto di Biofisica, Area della Ricerca CNR, Via Moruzzi 1, 56124 Pisa, Italy. ' Istituto di Biofisica, Area della Ricerca CNR, Via Moruzzi 1, 56124 Pisa, Italy

Abstract: This paper describes a digital system designed for the automatic detection and measurement of the velocity of moving objects in images acquired by means of a common TV-camera mounted onto a microscope. The main real-time features are: it can perform a real-time grey level difference between two successive frames in order to detect moving objects; it stores the images in the frame memory; it performs an automatic labelisation in order to recognise the moving micro-organisms; it calculates the area of the cells moving in the microscope field; it completes the analysis in few seconds.

Keywords: digital microscopy; labelisation; speed parameters; swimming microorganisms; translational speeds; rotational speeds; object velocity; moving objects; cell area.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSISE.2008.017770

International Journal of Signal and Imaging Systems Engineering, 2008 Vol.1 No.1, pp.25 - 29

Published online: 12 Apr 2008 *

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