Lab color space silver and red in situ hybridization based techniques for detecting genes in tissue samples

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10521644-B2
Application number	US-201314372673-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 29, 2013
Priority date	Feb 1, 2012
Publication date	Dec 31, 2019
Grant date	Dec 31, 2019

Abstract

A computer-based specimen analyzer (10) is configured to detect a level of expression of genes in a cell sample by detecting dots that represent differently stained genes and chromosomes in a cell. The color of the stained genes and the chromosomes is enhanced and filtered to produce a dot mask that defines areas in the image that are genes, chromosomes, or non-genetic material. Metrics are determined for the dots and/or pixels in the image of the cell in areas corresponding to the dots. The metrics are fed to a classifier that separates genes from chromosomes. The results of the classifier are counted to estimate the expression level of genes in the tissue samples.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method for automated scoring of a tissue specimen, comprising:
a) applying a first in situ hybridization probe and a second in situ hybridization probe to the tissue specimen, wherein each of the first in situ hybridization probe and the second in situ hybridization probe comprises a silver in situ hybridization probe or a red in situ hybridization probe;
b) subsequently obtaining a digital image of the tissue specimen;
c) enhancing the digital image by converting the digital image from an RGB color space to an L*a*b* color space;
d) selecting a field of view;
e) employing an automatic cell-detection and/or nucleus-detection algorithm to select candidate nuclei within the field of view in the digital image for quantitative analysis;
f) automatically counting in the candidate nuclei a first signal from the first in situ hybridization probe and a second signal from the second in situ hybridization probe; and
g) estimating a ratio of the counts of the first and second signal.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising repeating steps e), f), and g) for a second field of view in the digital image.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the tissue specimen comprises a breast cancer specimen and wherein the method further comprises a step h) reporting the ratio.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein step d) is performed automatically.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein step e) is performed automatically.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising h) displaying an image of the field of view and the ratio.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein step d) comprises analyzing a color balance of signals from the first and second in situ hybridization probes and selecting the field of view if the color balance meets a predetermined criteria.

Assignees

• Ventana Med Syst Inc

Inventors

• Bamford Pascal
• Chukka Srinivas
• Martin Jim F
• Sarkar Anindya
• Sertel Olcay
• Suzue Ellen
• Varangaonkar Harshal

Classifications

• G06V20/698

  Matching; Classification · CPC title

• G06T7/0012 Primary

  Biomedical image inspection · CPC title

• G06T2207/10056

  Microscopic image · CPC title

• G06T7/90

  Determination of colour characteristics · CPC title

• G06T2207/30024

  Cell structures in vitro; Tissue sections in vitro · CPC title