Jiřík Miroslav, Tonar Zbyněk, Králíčková Anna, Eberlová Lada, Mírka Hynek, Kochová Petra, Gregor Tomáš, Hošek Petr, Svobodová Miroslava, Rohan Eduard, Králíčková Milena, Liška Václav
European Centre of Excellence NTIS, Faculty of Applied Sciences, University of West Bohemia, Univerzitní 22, 306 14, Pilsen, Czech Republic.
Biomedical Center, Faculty of Medicine in Pilsen, Charles University in Prague, Alej Svobody 76, 323 00, Pilsen, Czech Republic.
Int J Comput Assist Radiol Surg. 2016 Oct;11(10):1803-19. doi: 10.1007/s11548-016-1378-3. Epub 2016 Mar 23.
Quantitative description of hepatic microvascular bed could contribute to understanding perfusion CT imaging. Micro-CT is a useful method for the visualization and quantification of capillary-passable vascular corrosion casts. Our aim was to develop and validate open-source software for the statistical description of the vascular networks in micro-CT scans.
Porcine hepatic microvessels were injected with Biodur E20 resin, and the resulting corrosion casts were scanned with 1.9-4.7 [Formula: see text] resolution. The microvascular network was quantified using newly developed QuantAn software both in randomly selected volume probes (n = 10) and in arbitrarily outlined hepatic lobules (n = 4). The volumes, surfaces, lengths, and numbers of microvessel segments were estimated and validated in the same data sets with manual stereological counting. Calculations of tortuosity, radius histograms, length histograms, exports of the skeletonized vascular network into open formats, and an assessment of the degree of their anisotropy were performed.
Within hepatic lobules, the microvessels had a volume fraction of 0.13 [Formula: see text] 0.05, surface density of 21.0 [Formula: see text] 2.0 [Formula: see text], length density of 169.0 [Formula: see text] 40.2 [Formula: see text], and numerical density of 588.5 [Formula: see text] 283.1 [Formula: see text]. Sensitivity analysis of the automatic analysis to binary opening, closing, threshold offset, and aggregation radius of branching nodes was performed.
The software QuantAn and its source code are openly available to researchers working in the field of stochastic geometry of microvessels in micro-CT scans or other three-dimensional imaging methods. The implemented methods comply with reproducible stereological techniques, and they were highly consistent with manual counting. Preliminary morphometrics of the classical hepatic lobules in pig were provided.
对肝微血管床进行定量描述有助于理解灌注CT成像。显微CT是一种用于可视化和量化可通过毛细血管的血管铸型的有用方法。我们的目的是开发并验证用于统计描述显微CT扫描中血管网络的开源软件。
用Biodur E20树脂注入猪肝脏微血管，然后用1.9 - 4.7 [公式：见正文] 的分辨率扫描所得的铸型。使用新开发的QuantAn软件在随机选择的体积探针（n = 10）和任意勾勒的肝小叶（n = 4）中对微血管网络进行量化。在相同数据集中通过手动体视学计数对微血管段的体积、表面积、长度和数量进行估计和验证。进行了曲折度计算、半径直方图、长度直方图、将骨骼化血管网络导出为开放格式以及对其各向异性程度的评估。
在肝小叶内，微血管的体积分数为0.13 [公式：见正文] 0.05，表面密度为21.0 [公式：见正文] 2.0 [公式：见正文]，长度密度为169.0 [公式：见正文] 40.2 [公式：见正文]，数值密度为588.5 [公式：见正文] 283.1 [公式：见正文]。对自动分析针对二元开运算、闭运算、阈值偏移和分支节点聚集半径进行了敏感性分析。
QuantAn软件及其源代码向从事显微CT扫描或其他三维成像方法中微血管随机几何领域研究的人员开放。所实施的方法符合可重复的体视学技术，并且与手动计数高度一致。提供了猪经典肝小叶的初步形态计量学数据。
