Image-analysis tools in the study of morphofunctional features of neurons

We focused on the quantitative assessment of shape changes observed in neuronal populations upon chemical stimulation. In particular, we studied pure cultures of rat hippocampal neurons, after fixation, by fluorescence microscopy. The number of dendrites in CNF1 treated hippocampal cells was substantially reduced as compared to controls, and significant changeswere observed in the shape of the cells body. Our results, obtained by systematic use of image analysis software tools, underline the importance of quantitative cell morphometry to clarify detailed structure-function relationships, a critical step in the design of reliable mechanistic models. The quite similar and promising approach concerning the analysis of high-resolution images of alive and mobile cells grown in micro-devices, is briefly discussed. © 2012 Taylor & Francis Group.