Heidelberg Image Control

[Jacqualine Henington]

TheSPECTRALIS is an ophthalmic imaging platform with an upgradable, modular design. This platform allows clinicians to configure each SPECTRALIS to the specific diagnostic workflow in the practice or clinic.

As an expandable platform, it can be upgraded with additional scanning laser fundus imaging modalities, such as BluePeak autofluorescence and MultiColor, as well as advanced modules such as OCT2 and the Glaucoma Module Premium Edition.

As an expandable platform, it can be upgraded any time with additional modules, such as the Glaucoma Module Premium Edition, the OCT2 Module, as well as the Widefield Imaging and Ultra-Widefield Angiography Modules.

The SPECTRALIS HRA is always delivered with a panning camera head and an external touch panel control for easy adjustment and acquisition that in particular facilitates dye-based angiography with FA or ICGA.

Heidelberg Engineering continuously optimizes imaging and healthcare IT technologies to provide ophthalmic diagnostic solutions that empower clinicians to improve patient care. From its inception in 1990, the company has collaborated with scientists, clinicians and industry to develop innovative products that deliver clinically relevant benefits.

Uncompromising quality and education play a large part in fostering the diagnostic confidence that has become synonymous with the global brand. The company's substantial expertise in the development and implementation of intelligent image and data management solutions complements its distinguished history in the design, manufacture and distribution of ophthalmic diagnostic instruments.

Heidelberg Engineering's growing product portfolio combines these core technologies: confocal microscopy, scanning lasers and optics, optical coherence tomography (OCT), real-time image processing and analytics, multimodal image management solutions (PACS), electronic medical records (EMR) and large-scale data analysis.

What are its main features? In addition to the print control strip, Image Control can also analyse and use LAB values directly from the printed image to control the ink zones. Keller says this minimises colour fluctuations across large print runs and repeat jobs, as well as in single printed images. The spectrophotometer can manage up to four presses online and serves as the quality control centre for both the pressroom and pre-media. It can be fully integrated with Prinect workflow.

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Background: Documentation of the retinal nerve fiber layer using red free light is not established as a routine method. The reasons for this are the difficulties involved in taking the pictures and developing them, especially in glaucoma patients, and the need for maximum pupil dilation. The scanning laser ophthalmoscope (SLO) allows fast and easy documentation of the fundus with the possibility of simultaneous image control during the examination.

Patients and methods: Nerve fiber layer images of 48 eyes of 25 patients taken with the argon blue light of the SLO were compared to conventional photographs of the nerve fiber layer with red-free light. In addition, we compared documentation of the nerve fiber layer using argon-blue or argon-green light in the SLO.

Results: The nerve fiber layer images obtained with the SLO were of good quality for all 48 eyes included in the study, whereas with conventional photography we could not obtain images in 9 eyes. There was a high correlation between the two methods in the detection of localized damage or zones with diffuse nerve fiber atrophy for the 39 eyes documented with both methods, and there was better image quality in some using the SLO. The use of blue light permits the nerve fiber layer to be seen more easily than with green light.

Conclusions: The SLO allows nerve fiber bundle defects or diffuse atrophy to be detected similar to conventional fundus photographs using red free light sources. There is no further need to dilate the pupil maximally due to the confocal principle and the scanning technique. The smaller angle of view of the SLO requires fixation movements of the patient being examined for the detection of beginning peripheral nerve fiber bundle defects.

The Nikon Imaging Center (NIC@Uni-Heidelberg) is a core facility for light microscopy at the University of Heidelberg, developed in partnership with Nikon, Andor, PerkinElmer LAS, Laboratory Imaging (LIM), AHF Analysentechnik, Scientific Volume Imaging and Prior Scientific. The NIC provides all researchers of the Bio Sciences at the University with access and training to state-of-the-art light microscopy.

The A1R features a "hybrid scanner" (two scanners in one scanning-head). A glavano scanner for low-noise images ranging in resolution from 64 x 64 up to 4096 x 4096 pixels and a resonant scanner that is capable of taking up to 30 full 512 x 512 pixel frames per second. Both scanners can be used in parallel: while the fast resonant scanner is acquiring images, the Galvano scanner may perform bleaching or activation of user-defined regions of interest.

The Nikon TIRF system with Nikon's H-TIRF module is an inverted and fully automated ECLIPSE Ti2 microscope with objective TIRF illumination. A Nikon Perfect Focus System (PFS of the 4th generation) is included that continuously determines the distance to the coverslip and readjusts it if necessary (to counteract thermal drift or vibrations). For live cell imaging of mammalian cells, the system is equipped with an on-stage incubation chamber from TokaiHit, controlling temperature, CO2 concentration, and humidity.

The Nikon N-SIM structured illumination microscope on an ECLIPSE Ti inverted microscope is equipped with 4 lasers (405, 488, 561, 640nm), covering a wide range of fluorescent dyes. The N-SIM approximately doubles the resolution of conventional optical microscopes (to around 100nm lateral and 200nm axial) by combining the "structured illumination microscopy" technology licensed from UCSF. The system allows a time-resolution of 1.66 frames/s.

With its increased FOV, sensitive GaAsP detectors, and up to 8k x 8k scanning, the AX confocal system includes innovative features powered by artificial intelligence (AI) that dramatically enhance usability for both veteran and novice users. Configured with Nikon's flagship inverted microscope, the ECLIPSE Ti2-E, the AX system is completely integrated using Nikon's NIS-Elements C imaging software package.

The ECLIPSE Ti2 CrestOptics system is a spinning disk confocal with 7 laser lines that allows to the user to remove the spinning disk so that it may also be used in widefileld. This system supports all capabilities of Nikon's NIS-Elements imaging software as well as Nikon's Perfect Focus System (PFS).

The Ti-HCS is a fully automated, inverted Nikon ECLIPSE Ti2 microscope made for high content screening tasks. The microscope is encased by a environmental box from OkoLab for temperature-, CO2- and humidity control. The "JOBS" software module in Nikon's NIS-Elements acquisition software makes it possible to screen in x/y, z, and t everything from a LabTek dish to a multiwell plate. Images can be taken in brightfield and epifluorescence.

The ECLIPSE Ni-E is a fully motorized high-end upright research microscope mainly meant to image fixed samples that are either fluorescently labeled, histologically stained, or untreated. Fluorescent samples can be imaged in superior quality with a low noise, high sensitive Nikon DS-Qi2 black and white camera. Five filter cubes in the excitation/emission range of DAPI, FITC, TRITC, Texas Red and Cy5 are available. Histological sections may be imaged with a Nikon DS-Ri2 color camera that offers resolutions of up to 4908 x 3264 pixels. Untreated samples, even thin unlabelled cells, can be visualized by using Differential Interference Contrast (DIC). The Ni-E has a motorized stage that allows for automatic stitching: Areas on a slide larger than the field that a given objective can image can be automatically captured as a series of frames, which are then seamlessly stitched together by the NIS-Elements acquisition software.

The Nikon SMZ25 stereo microscope is a high-end, versatile optical instrument designed for advanced research applications, featuring a revolutionary zoom system and a large zoom range. The SMZ25 offers brightfield and epifluorescence illumination (X-Cite Xylis LED light source) in three channels: DAPI/EGFP/DsRed and provides exceptionally high-resolution images and a wide field of view, making it ideal for detailed, three-dimensional observations in fields like molecular biology, cell biology, neurobiology, embryology, developmental biology and systems biology.

The SMZ1270 is a stereo binocular with a Nikon Plan Apo 0.75 and a ED Plan 2X objective that can be used with epifluorescence (red and green excitation). The working distance is 107 and 35 mm. A zooming mechanism with a range from 0.63 to 8x is included (there is no camera or computer attached to this microscope).

Deformation-based morphometry enables the automatic quantification of neuroanatomical differences by measuring regional shape and volume differences between a reference space and the population under investigation. In this paper we use deformation-based morphometric methods to study volumetric differences between preterm infants at term equivalent age and term born controls using high-resolution MR imaging, and we investigate the influence of the choice of reference image on results obtained. We constructed mean atlases of preterm infants at term equivalent age and term born infants using three different reference spaces, and used them to compare the brains of the two groups. A non-rigid registration algorithm was used to map all 3 atlases into a common coordinate system and volumetric differences were extracted. Our results demonstrate significant volume differences between preterm infants at term equivalent age and the control group in the ventricular system, the interhemispheric fissure anteriorly, and the globus pallidus and thalamus. Morphometric changes are consistent between all three maps of volume change and indicate that the results obtained using deformation-based morphometry are largely independent of the choice of the reference space.

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