Rodrigues Pedro Miguel, Luís Jorge, Tavaria Freni Kekhasharú
CBQF-Centro de Biotecnologia e Química Fina-Laboratório Associado, Escola Superior de Biotecnologia, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Rua de Diogo Botelho 1327, 4169-005 Porto, Portugal.
Bioengineering (Basel). 2022 Jun 22;9(7):271. doi: 10.3390/bioengineering9070271.
Accurate quantitative analysis of microorganisms is recognized as an essential tool for gauging safety and quality in microbiology settings in a wide range of fields. The enumeration process of viable microorganisms via traditional culturing techniques are methodically convenient and cost-effective, conferring high applicability worldwide. However, manual counting can be time-consuming, laborious and imprecise. Furthermore, particular cases require an urgent and accurate response for effective processing.
To reduce time limitations and discrepancies, this work introduces an image processing method capable of semi-automatically quantifying the number of colony forming units (CFUs). This rapid enumeration technique enables the technician to provide an expeditious assessment of the microbial load of a given sample. To test and validate the system, three bacterial species were cultured, and a labeled database was created, with subsequent image acquisition.
The system demonstrated acceptable classification measures; the mean values of , and were: (1) 95%, 95% and 0.95 for ; (2) 91%, 91% and 0.90 for ; and (3) 84%, 86% and 0.85 for .
Evidence related to the time-saving potential of the system was achieved; the time spent on quantification tasks of plates with a high number of colonies might be reduced to a half and occasionally to a third.
微生物的准确定量分析被认为是评估广泛领域微生物学环境中安全性和质量的重要工具。通过传统培养技术对活微生物进行计数的过程在方法上方便且具有成本效益，在全球范围内具有很高的适用性。然而，人工计数可能耗时、费力且不准确。此外，特定情况需要快速准确的响应以进行有效处理。
为了减少时间限制和差异，本研究引入了一种能够半自动定量菌落形成单位（CFU）数量的图像处理方法。这种快速计数技术使技术人员能够对给定样品的微生物负荷进行快速评估。为了测试和验证该系统，培养了三种细菌，并创建了一个标记数据库，随后进行图像采集。
该系统展示了可接受的分类指标；对于[具体指标1]，[指标1]、[指标2]和[指标3]的平均值分别为：（1）95%、95%和0.95；对于[具体指标2]，分别为：（2）91%、91%和0.90；对于[具体指标3]，分别为：（3）84%、86%和0.85。
获得了与该系统节省时间潜力相关的证据；对具有大量菌落的平板进行定量任务所花费的时间可能会减少一半，偶尔会减少到三分之一。
