DeepACSON automated segmentation of white matter in 3D electron microscopy

Tracing the entirety of ultrastructures in large three-dimensional electron microscopy (3D-EM) images of the brain tissue requires automated segmentation techniques. Current segmentation techniques use deep convolutional neural networks (DCNNs) and rely on high-contrast cellular membranes and high-resolution EM volumes. On the other hand, segmenting low-resolution, large EM volumes requires methods to account for severe membrane discontinuities inescapable. Therefore, we developed DeepACSON, which performs DCNN-based semantic segmentation and shape-decomposition-based instance segmentation. DeepACSON instance segmentation uses the tubularity of myelinated axons and decomposes under-segmented myelinated axons into their constituent axons. We applied DeepACSON to ten EM volumes of rats after sham-operation or traumatic brain injury, segmenting hundreds of thousands of long-span myelinated axons, thousands of cell nuclei, and millions of mitochondria with excellent evaluation scores. DeepACSON quantified the morphology and spatial aspects of white matter ultrastructures, capturing nanoscopic morphological alterations five months after the injury. With DeepACSON, Abdollahzadeh et al. combines existing deep learning-based methods for semantic segmentation and a novel shape decomposition technique for the instance segmentation. The pipeline is used to segment low-resolution 3D-EM datasets allowing quantification of white matter morphology in large fields-of-view.

Automated summary

DeepACSON is a segmentation software based on deep learning that allows for efficient tracking and segmentation of ultrastructures in brain tissues, providing excellent analysis and evaluation results. By combining existing semantic segmentation methods with a novel shape decomposition technique, DeepACSON achieves effective instance segmentation and white matter morphology quantification in low-resolution 3D-EM datasets.