Automated analysis of zebrafish images for screening toxicants.

An important factor facilitating the application of zebrafish in biomedical research is high throughput screening of vertebrate animal models. For example, being able to model the growth of blood vessel in the vasculature system is interesting for understanding both the circulatory system in humans, and for facilitating large scale screening of the influence of various chemicals on vascular development. Compared to other models, the zebrafish embryo is an attractive alternative for environmental risk assessment of chemicals since it offers the possibility to perform high-throughput analyses in vivo.

3D imaging for quantitative assessment of toxicity on vascular development in zebrafish.

In this study, we describe the utility of the zebrafish model of in-vivo blood vessel formation as a tool for chemical risk assessment. Time-lapse confocal imaging of embryonic vasculature in the zebrafish is used in conjunction with digital image analysis to monitor and quantify the effect of toxins on vascular development. Non-rigid registration is used to capture changes in vascular morphology over time.