OpenBloodFlow: A User-Friendly OpenCV-Based Software Package for Blood Flow Velocity and Blood Cell Count Measurement for Fish Embryos

The transparent appearance of fish embryos provides an excellent assessment feature for observing cardiovascular function in vivo. Previously, methods to conduct vascular function assessment were based on measuring blood-flow velocity using third-party software. In this study, we reported a simple s...

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Published inBiology (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 11; no. 10; p. 1471
Main Authors Farhan, Ali, Saputra, Ferry, Suryanto, Michael Edbert, Humayun, Fahad, Pajimna, Roi Martin B., Vasquez, Ross D., Roldan, Marri Jmelou M., Audira, Gilbert, Lai, Hong-Thih, Lai, Yu-Heng, Hsiao, Chung-Der
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Basel MDPI AG 08.10.2022
MDPI
Subjects
Algorithms
Aorta
Artificial intelligence
Blood
Blood cells
Blood flow
Blood vessels
Coronary vessels
Danio rerio
Datasets
Design
Embryos
Flow velocity
Gunner Farneback algorithm
Image processing
Language
medaka
Medical research
Methods
OpenCV
Physiology
Software
Velocity
Zebrafish
China
Taiwan
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Summary:The transparent appearance of fish embryos provides an excellent assessment feature for observing cardiovascular function in vivo. Previously, methods to conduct vascular function assessment were based on measuring blood-flow velocity using third-party software. In this study, we reported a simple software, free of costs and skills, called OpenBloodFlow, which can measure blood flow velocity and count blood cells in fish embryos for the first time. First, videos captured by high-speed CCD were processed for better image stabilization and contrast. Next, the optical flow of moving objects was extracted from the non-moving background in a frame-by-frame manner. Finally, blood flow velocity was calculated by the Gunner Farneback algorithm in Python. Data validation with zebrafish and medaka embryos in OpenBloodFlow was consistent with our previously published ImageJ-based method. We demonstrated consistent blood flow alterations by either OpenBloodFlow or ImageJ in the dorsal aorta of zebrafish embryos when exposed to either phenylhydrazine or ractopamine. In addition, we validated that OpenBloodFlow was able to conduct precise blood cell counting. In this study, we provide an easy and fully automatic programming for blood flow velocity calculation and blood cell counting that is useful for toxicology and pharmacology studies in fish.
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These authors contributed equally to this work.
ISSN:2079-7737
2079-7737
DOI:10.3390/biology11101471