A sample of Frequently Asked Questions
My cells of interest have a somewhat clustered distribution. Does this affect accuracy of my counts?
A more or less clustered distribution does not affect accuracy but does require adjusting your sampling strategy to achieve maximal efficiency.
The Stereologer identifies the major sources of variability in your data and adjusts your sampling parameters accordingly. In this way the system automatically optimizes your sampling effort for maximum efficiency, which in turn increases your throughput, i.e., work completed per unit time.
What is the Corpuscle Problem?
The Corpuscle Problem refers to bias due to object size, shape, and orientation. All of these factors can introduce systematic error (bias) when attempting to count cells on stained tissue sections. The optical director first proposed by Gundersen (1986) uses the disector principle (Sterio, 1984) to avoid this bias by counting 3-D object during thin focal plane optical sectioning.
Are student discounts available for your neurostereology courses?
Our merit-based Stereology Fellowship Program offers full waiver of registration fees. Also, early registration allows students to take advantage of reduced registration fees and discounted rates on hotel rooms.
My sections are cut in a coronal plane. Can I still use Space Balls to quantify fiber length?
The Space Balls approach by Mouton et al. (2002) uses a sphere probe to quantify length of fibers, capillaries, etc. Because a sphere contains all integral angles, tissue sections can be cut at any convenient direction, e.g., coronal, horizontal. Prior to the Space Balls method, rotating tissue prior to sectioning caused serious problems with locating tissue landmarks. Also, tissue sections not previously rotated from older (archival) studies can now be analyzed without bias using the Space Balls method.