SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR AUTOMATED CHARACTERIZATION OF GENETIC HETEROGENEITY IN TISSUE SAMPLES

摘要

Systems and methods for the quantitative automated analysis of pathology samples identify groups of spatially-associated similar cells. Cells may be identified as belonging to a group on the basis of spatial location and biomarkers. In some embodiments the biomarkers are multicolour fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) signals. Characteristics of the cells in a group may be combined to provide quantitative FISH results that may compensate for variations and artefacts such as thin sectioning that can result in the loss of information due to damage. In heterogeneous tissue samples, grouping cells can permit quantitative results regarding pathological cells to be extracted despite the presences of infiltrating non pathological cells.