This book discusses the theory and the practice of using Fourier descriptors as a method for measuring the shape of whole, or parts of organisms.

"John Russ is the master of explaining how image processing gets applied to real-world situations. With Brent Neal, he’s done it again in Measuring Shape, this time explaining an expanded toolbox of techniques that includes useful, state-of-the-art methods that can be applied to the broad problem of understanding, characterizing, and measuring shape. He has a gift for finding the kernel of a particular algorithm, explaining it in simple terms, then giving concrete examples that are easily understood. His perspective comes from solving real-world problems and separating out what works in practice from what is just an abstract curiosity." —Tom Malzbender, Hewlett-Packard Laboratories, Palo Alto, California, USA Useful for those working in fields including industrial quality control, research, and security applications, Measuring Shape is a handbook for the practical application of shape measurement. Covering a wide range of shape measurements likely to be encountered in the literature and in software packages, this book presents an intentionally diverse set of examples that illustrate and enable readers to compare methods used for measurement and quantitative description of 2D and 3D shapes. It stands apart through its focus on examples and applications, which help readers quickly grasp the usefulness of presented techniques without having to approach them through the underlying mathematics. An elusive concept, shape is a principal governing factor in determining the behavior of objects and structures. Essential to recognizing and classifying objects, it is the central link in manmade and natural processes. Shape dictates everything from the stiffness of a construction beam, to the ability of a leaf to catch water, to the marketing and packaging of consumer products. This book emphasizes techniques that are quantitative and produce a meaningful yet compact set of numerical values that can be used for statistical analysis, comparison, correlation, classification, and identification. Written by two renowned authors from both industry and academia, this resource explains why users should select a particular method, rather than simply discussing how to use it. Showcasing each process in a clear, accessible, and well-organized way, they explore why a particular one might be appropriate in a given situation, yet a poor choice in another. Providing extensive examples, plus full mathematical descriptions of the various measurements involved, they detail the advantages and limitations of each method and explain the ways they can be implemented to discover important correlations between shape and object history or behavior. This uncommon assembly of information also includes sets of data on real-world objects that are used to compare the performance and utility of the various presented approaches.

High-resolution images of phytoplankton cells such as diatoms or desmids, which are useful for monitoring water quality, can now be provided by digital microscopes, facilitating the automated analysis and identification of specimens. Conventional approaches are based on optical microscopy; however, manual image analysis is impractical due to the huge diversity of this group of microalgae and its great morphological plasticity. As such, there is a need for automated recognition techniques for diagnostic tools (e.g. environmental monitoring networks, early warning systems) to improve the management of water resources and decision-making processes. Describing the entire workflow of a bioindicator system, from capture, analysis and identification to the determination of quality indices, this book provides insights into the current state-of-the-art in automatic identification systems in microscopy.

The idea of form is one of the most fundamental concepts underlying all of the sciences. Our visual system is so well developed that we are able to effortlessly classify and compare visual images. What is not so well developed has been our ability to measure this visual information. This book examines a number of recent approaches currently in use to numerically characterize the biological form. It presents a unique overview of these methods, starting with a review of measurement set in a historical framework. The book will be of interest to graduate students in addition to a wide range of researchers, including those in the specialized fields of human biology, growth and development, orthodontics, botany, biology, ecology, zoology, as well as dentistry and medicine.

This is a biography of Bernard G Sarnat, SB, MD, MS, DDS, FACS, a remarkable man who lived for most of the 20th century. Born in 1912 in the USA, he was the son of immigrant parents from Belarus, a former republic of the USSR. He received his MD degree from the University of Chicago, and his MS and DDS degrees from the University of Illinois. Dr Sarnat was a practitioner in the formative years of modern plastic surgery as well as an internationally known biological researcher in the area of craniofacial biology. He was one of the first bone researchers to apply the stain alizarin red S to document the pattern of dental and bone growth, and has published over 220 research papers dealing with bone and teeth biology.Bernard G Sarnat: 20th Century Plastic Surgeon and Biological Scientist is the story of not only a successful physician-scientist, but also a warm and caring individual who is dedicated to his family, as revealed by the many personal details in this biography. Thus, this biography is intended not just for researchers in the biology of bone and teeth, but also for medical and dental students as well the general reader interested in science and medicine.

This volume represents an ongoing series entitled Biological Shape Analysis, of which this is the 4th Edition. These proceedings represent state-of-the-art research in the field of biology, broadly-based, that deal with the quantitative analysis of the shape of the biological form. These numerical analyses include Fourier analytic methods, wavelets, neural networks, machine vision, machine learning, median axis transforms, spectral clustering, genome-wide association studies, 3D surface mapping, as well as more traditional morphometric approaches. Studies included are drawn from research in agricultural genetics, anatomy, anthropology, botany, dentistry, entomology, forensics, human evolution, paleontology, primatology, to name a few.The shape of forms can be considered of central importance in terms of identification, comparison, and classification of biological organisms. These proceedings, of which this is the fourth one, are unique in that they deal extensively with a wide range of organisms in biology, including both fauna and flora. They bring together diverse practitioners from a wide variety of disciplines. This represents a major departure from the current emphasis on specialization in the biological sciences. It is of particular importance to note that these issues dealing with shape analysis of biological structures are found to be common across very diverse disciplines and these proceedings are the first ones to highlight this.There are no volumes currently available that are as broadly-based as these proceedings in dealing with the quantification of shape analysis. (1) These volumes are unique in their diversity in covering the biological disciplines; (2) The emphasis on numerical approaches; and (3) the numerous state-of-the-art research papers.

The Proceedings describe the current state of research dealing with biological shape analysis. The quantitative analysis of the shape of biological organisms represents a challenge that has now seen breakthroughs with new methodologies such as elliptical Fourier analysis, quantitative trait loci analysis (QTLs), chromosome segment substitution lines (CSSLs), thin plate splines, etc. The Proceedings also illustrate the diversity of disciplines that are actively involved in the characterization and analysis of biological shape. Moreover, many of the papers focus on the relationship of the shape to the processes that determine the biological form, an issue of major continuing concern in biology.