ISBN: 1859960898 9781859960899

Category: Medical / Neuroscience

Page count: 277

Present a practical guide to making unbiased 3D measurements using microscopy. Stereology is the statistical inference of geometric parameters from spatially sampled information; it is considered unbiased whent he test probes are positioned in an appropriately random manner. This volume includes only those stereological techniques that have been tried and tested by actual application. Although these techniques are essentially mathematical--unbiased stereology is a quantitative rather than qualitative approach to microscopy-the authors do not immerse the reader in complex theories. Instead, they provide simple heuristic explanations and references to the original proof, illustrating the theory with analogies draw from everyday experience. Exercises-provided at the end of each chapter, complete with detailed worked answers-have been developed by the authors or donated by other expert stereologists to give practical experience using the techniques. Specific topis covered include: random sampling and random geometry; the estimation of feature volume, surface, length, number and mean particle size; as well as statistics for stereologists.