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Viral Spread Quantification
Study changes in cell growth and death, along with spread of the viral infection over time.
Applications include viral plaque assays and general infection assays to study neighbor-neighbor infection. Detect single cells or nuclei in two colors to identify cellular populations present together in the sample.
Key Features
- Label two cell types to measure area covered by each and contact area between them
- Quantify infected vs. non-infected cell counts
- Identify groups of nearby cells to identify colonies
- Count number of neighboring cells of each cell type
The WiSoft Athena Viral Spread application enables novel insight to researchers screening test compounds or antibodies for interference with viral spread between adjacent cells in a monolayer.
Analysis is compatible with stitched montage images visualizing large areas of multi-well plates or dishes, typically acquired at low magnification with numerous metrics provided.
The software first identifies cells through their nucleus, then detects their cytoplasmic borders. Within each cell, it uses an infection-specific channel to identify each cell as infected or healthy. Optionally, it can also measure fluorescence signal in an additional protein of interest (POI) channel to monitor cellular responses to infection.
For each cell, the application measures:
- Cell morphology (area, perimeter, shape)
- Cell fluorescence intensity (Virus and POI)
- Ratio of infected vs. healthy cells
- Number of neighbors per cell: infected vs. healthy
- Percentage of the perimeter per cell in contact with neighbors: infected vs. healthy.
Researchers can thusly study changes in cell growth and death, along with spread of the viral infection over time.
For each cell, the application measures:
- Cell morphology (area, perimeter, shape)
- Cell fluorescence intensity (Virus and POI)
- Ratio of infected vs. healthy cells
- Number of neighbors per cell: infected vs. healthy
- Percentage of the perimeter per cell in contact with neighbors: infected vs. healthy.
