Department of Ophthalmology, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany.
PLoS One. 2023 Aug 22;18(8):e0290420. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0290420. eCollection 2023.
To establish a workflow to visualize the surgical anatomy in 3D based on histological data of eyes of experimental animals for improving the planning of complex surgical procedures.
Four C57BL/6J wild-type(wt) mouse eyes, three Brown Norway rat eyes and four Chinchilla Bastard rabbit eyes were enucleated and processed for standard histology with serial sections and hematoxylin and eosin staining. Image stacks were processed to obtain a representation of the eye anatomy in 3D. In addition, virtual image stacks and 3D point clouds were generated by processing sagittal sections of eyes with stepwise 180° rotation and projection around the eye axis to construct a rotationally symmetric 3D model from one single sagittal section.
Serial sections of whole eyes of mice, rats and rabbits showed significant artifacts interfering with a practical image stack generation and straightforward 3D reconstruction despite the application of image registration techniques. A workflow was established to obtain a 3D image of the eye based on virtual image stacks and point cloud generation by rotation of a single sagittal section of the eye around the symmetry axis. By analyzing the tissue shrinkage during histological processing true biometric reconstructions of the eyes were feasible making the resulting model usable for 3D modeling and simulation, e.g. for planning of complex surgical procedures in different species.
Because serial sections of the eye with standard histological protocols yielded too many artifacts for a straightforward 3D visualization we reconstructed a pseudorealistic 3D model based on virtual image stacks and point cloud generation calculated from a single sagittal section of the eye. Such a model detailing microscopic structures of the whole eye will allow for a specific planning of surgical procedures in small animal eyes in order to prevent surgical complications in a very early stage of an experiment and it will support the design and development of complex intraocular implants. It will therefore be helpful in surgical teaching and improve laboratory animal welfare by an expected reduction of experimental animal numbers. Further processing including integration of mechanical tissue properties is needed to convert these 3D models into a practical virtual reality teaching and simulation platform for eyes of several species.
建立一种基于实验动物眼部组织学数据的 3D 可视化手术解剖的工作流程，以改进复杂手术的规划。
共对 4 只 C57BL/6J 野生型（wt）小鼠眼球、3 只褐鼠眼球和 4 只 Chinchilla Bastard 兔眼球进行了眼眶切除术并进行标准组织学处理，包括连续切片和苏木精-伊红染色。对图像堆栈进行处理，以获得眼部 3D 解剖结构的表示。此外，通过对眼球矢状切片进行逐步 180°旋转和沿眼球轴投影，生成虚拟图像堆栈和 3D 点云，从而从单个矢状切片构建旋转对称的 3D 模型。
尽管应用了图像配准技术，但小鼠、大鼠和兔全眼球的连续切片仍存在严重的伪影，严重干扰了实用的图像堆栈生成和直接的 3D 重建。建立了一种基于虚拟图像堆栈和点云生成的工作流程，通过眼球对称轴的旋转获取眼球的 3D 图像。通过分析组织在组织学处理过程中的收缩，实现了眼球的真实生物测量重建，使得所得到的模型可用于 3D 建模和模拟，例如不同物种复杂手术规划。
由于标准组织学方案的眼球连续切片产生了太多的伪影，无法直接进行 3D 可视化，因此我们基于从眼球单个矢状切片计算得出的虚拟图像堆栈和点云生成重建了一个逼真的 3D 模型。这种详细描述整个眼球微观结构的模型将允许对小动物眼球进行特定的手术规划，以在实验的早期阶段防止手术并发症，并支持复杂眼内植入物的设计和开发。因此，它将有助于手术教学，并通过预期减少实验动物数量来提高实验室动物福利。进一步的处理包括机械组织特性的整合，以将这些 3D 模型转换为具有几种物种眼部的实用虚拟现实教学和模拟平台。
