DICOMization of Proprietary Files Obtained from Confocal, Whole-Slide, and FIB-SEM Microscope Scanners

Abstract

The evolution of biomedical imaging technology is allowing the digitization of hundreds of glass slides at once. There are multiple microscope scanners available in the market including low-cost solutions that can serve small centers. Moreover, new technology is being researched to acquire images and new modalities are appearing in the market such as electron microscopy. This reality offers new diagnostics tools to clinical practice but emphasizes also the lack of multivendor system’s interoperability. Without the adoption of standard data formats and communications methods, it will be impossible to build this industry through the installation of vendor-neutral archives and the establishment of telepathology services in the cloud. The DICOM protocol is a feasible solution to the aforementioned problem because it already provides an interface for visible light and whole slide microscope imaging modalities. While some scanners currently have DICOM interfaces, the vast majority of manufacturers continue to use proprietary solutions. This article proposes an automated DICOMization pipeline that can efficiently transform distinct proprietary microscope images from CLSM, FIB-SEM, and WSI scanners into standard DICOM with their biological information maintained within their metadata. The system feasibility and performance were evaluated with fifteen distinct proprietary modalities, including stacked WSI samples. The results demonstrated that the proposed methodology is accurate and can be used in production. The normalized objects were stored through the standard communications in the Dicoogle open-source archive.