Main Contribution

We have developed an algorithm to facilitate the tracing and quantitation of neurites in two-dimensional (2D) fluorescence microscopy images. The tracing is done interactively based on the specification of end points; the optimal path is determined on the fly from the optimization of a cost function using Dijkstra's shortest-path algorithm. The procedure also takes advantage of an improved ridge detector implemented by means of a steerable filterbank.

The software is available as a Java pluging, NeuronJ , for ImageJ.