Pixel Perfect: a real-time image processing system for biology

Scientific visioning systems often rely upon pixel-perfect precision to produce meaningful data. Cutting-edge equipment used in the study of cell signaling is no exception; proper image alignment is critical for successful experiments. Biologists at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory put together a special multi-spectral confocal microscope that was capable of producing live images of cells and proteins in two simultaneous spectral channels. But there was a problem: the dual images resembled poorly registered Sunday comics and were unusable. This article describes how the biologists worked with programmers to fix the difficulty and make the microscope a truly useful and unique device.