OpenImaDis: A platform to share biological images and processing applications

Modern biological imaging facilities generate large number of images and meta-data that need to be shared by multiple users for quality control, analysis and interpretation. Terabytes of images, multiple images formats and need to access images from multiple applications pose a challenge to effective image data-sets management at these imaging facilities. 

openImaDis(open Image Discovery) is a free and open source, web based image sharing and management platform. It was built by Strand Life Sciences in collaboration with Institut Curie. It facilitates storage, sharing, viewing and analysis of large image datasets.  It also allows users to publish analysis applications and workflows to be shared with other users.

In this talk, I will present how openImaDis  is being used by Institut Curie to manage images and analysis applications in a highly collaborative environment. The volume of images produced by the microscopy facility at a Institut curie, is estimated to be around 200 Terabytes a year, with data produced by around 40 different microscopes.  Images obtained by researchers at other facilities in case of remote collaborations further add to these numbers.  These images are accessed by both on-site and off-site researchers for processing, analysis and visualization to generate meaningful results. I will discuss how some of these image sharing projects have been set on Curie Image Database, which is an early installation of openImaDis. 

I will also talk about a proposal to set up access, viewing and analysis of histopathology images using openImaDis.

Short bio Nimisha Gupta

Nimisha is Vice President, Software at Strand Life Sciences, Bangalore. Nimisha has been at Strand for over a decade working on products and solutions for genomics and drug discovery research. Nimisha has contributed to several statistical and machine learning algorithms used in Strand’s AVADIS® platform that are now part of market leading products such as GeneSpring® and Mass Profiler Pro. Nimisha’s interests are to solve computational and user interface challenges in biology and healthcare, as part of which she is actively involved in the development of openImaDis, a web based platform to share biological images and analysis algorithms. Nimisha completed her masters in Computer Science from IISc, Bangalore.