Setting out the principles of stereology from a statistical viewpoint, this book focuses on both basic theory and practical implications. The authors discuss ways to effectively communicate statistical issues to clients, draw attention to common methodological errors, and provide references to essential literature. The first full text on design-bas

Setting out the principles of stereology from a statistical viewpoint, this book focuses on both basic theory and practical implications. The authors discuss ways to effectively communicate statistical issues to clients, draw attention to common methodological errors, and provide references to essential literature. The first full text on design-based stereology opens with a review of classical and modern stereology, followed by a treatment of mathematical foundations and then on to core techniques. The final chapters discuss implementing techniques in practical sampling designs, summarize understanding of the variance of stereological estimators, and describe open problems for further research. The book also details isotropic, vertical or local sampling designs for estimating stereological parameters such as volume, surface area, particle number and spatial distribution. This extensive text offers support to statistical consultants using examples, applications and unique Advice to Consultants sections. It contains numerous literature references, bibliographic notes and nearly 150 illustrations.

vi on geometric probability is included, students can be expected to create a few simple programs like those shown, but for other geometries. I am indebted to Tom Hare for critical reviews of the material and an endless enthusiasm to debate and derive stereological relationships; to John Matzka at Plenum Press for patiently instructing me in the intricacies of typesetting; to Chris Russ for helping to program many of these measurement techniques; and especially to Helen Adams, both for her patience with my creative fever to write yet another book, and for pointing out that the title, which I had intended to contrast to "theoretical stereology," can also be understood as the antonym of "impractical stereology." John C. Russ Raleigh,NC July, 1986 Chapter 1: Statistics 1 Accuracy and precision 1 The mean and standard deviation 5 Distributions 7 Comparison 13 Correlation 18 Nonlinear fitting 19 Chapter 2: Image Types 23 Planar sections 23 Projected images 25 Finite sections 28 Space-filling structures and dispersed phases 29 Types of images and contrast mechanisms 31 Sampling 32 Chapter 3: Manual Methods 35 Volume fraction 35 Surface density 38 Contiguity 41 Mean intercept length 42 Line density 43 Grain size determination 55 Curvature 48 Reticles to aid counting 49 Magnification and units 51 Chapter4: Size Distributions 53 Intercept length in spheres 53 Nonspherical shapes 57 Corrections for finite section thickness 59 Lamellae 61 Measurement of profile size 62 Nonspherical particles 69 vii Contents viii Chapter 5: Computer Metlwds 73

This book provides a unified exposition of local-stereological methods developed within the last 15 years. The object of local stereology is to draw inference about quantitative parameters of spatial structures which can be regarded as neighbourhoods of points, called reference points. The model example is a biological cell which can be regarded as a neighbourhood of its nucleus. In local stereology, information from sections through the reference point is used. Only very weak assumptions are needed for the structure under study. For instance, specific cell shape assumptions are not necessary.In order to reach a broader audience, the book has been written not only for specialists in stereology, integral geometry and geometric measure theory. In particular, Chapter 1 is an elementary introduction to stereology and the book contains about 75 illustrations. The theory of local steroelogy involves, however, advanced mathematical tools, which constitute an important part of the book.Local-stereological methods are now in world-wide use in the microscopical study of biological tissue, and this invaluable book also contains a description of how the local methods are used in practice.

Unbiased Stereology, Second Edition is a practical guide to making unbiased 3-D measurements via the microscope. Only those stereological techniques which have been tried and tested by real application are included. Although this technology is essentially mathematical and statistical, the authors do not immerse the reader in complex analysis, but rather provide simple heuristic explanations and references to the original proof, and illustrate the theory by analogies drawn from everyday experience. To give practical experience in application of the techniques, exercises are provided at the end of each chapter, complete with detailed worked answers.

In Unbiased Stereology, the authors present a practical guide to making unbiased 3D measurements using microscopy. Stereology is the statistical inference of geometric parameters from spatially sampled information; it is considered unbiased when the test probes are positioned in an appropriately random manner. Now that unbiased stereology is required for nerve-cell counts in neurotoxicology by the FDA and by many journals before the acceptance of an article or study, this book is essential reading. It includes only those stereological techniques that have been tried and tested by actual application. Specific topics covered include: random sampling and random geometry; the estimation of feature volume, surface, length, number and mean particle size; as well as statistics for stereologists.