Our Admin Team has been quite stretched for a while as our seasoned catchers can appreciate. They have been working hard to implement a new multi-functional platform to accommodate additional future projects and enhancements for Stall Catchers while tending to necessary workshops and seeking support for on-going activities and needed resources.
Three days ago, Pietro responded to an inquiry from CatchME! in the chat box; providing some very exciting information. Since information in the chat soon loses visibility, the essence of Pietroâs update follows so that others have the opportunity to see it. This might become a regular feature in the forum. Meanwhile, hereâs the news from Pietro:
Exciting news! We are working with Boston University to see if we can use Stall Catchers to examine capillary stalling not only in Alzheimerâs patients, but also in stroke patients! We hope to have some pilot data to share with you soon. Check for more details soon in the blog at blog.hcinst.org. We will, of course, continue to analyze data from the Schaffer-Nishimura Lab to accelerate the Alzheimerâs research (in case there was any doubt).
In case you missed it in the chat box, four days ago Pietro and company were at the Schaffer-Nishimura lab âmeeting with a new cadre of undergraduate researchers who are preparing new data for Stall Catchers.â They plan to post more info on this in the blog âsoon,â so be sure to check there now and then for updates.
OK, Iâve been informed that after a brief outage, the Forum has been updated and came back online August 10th.
Our fearless leader, Pietro, discovered that while Blog posts were supposed to be visible in the Forum, they had previously gone into a âhidden section,â which was why none of us could see them there (here).
So, from now on, anyone visiting this Forum will also be able to see the latest Blog postings as well. Just look for the big green âB.â (Except itâs a circle, not a square. Doinâ the best I can. )
Why we were (twice) stuck at 99.1% on the blue verification status bar. (My non-expert summary of Pietroâs explanation below was posted in the chat box yesterday.)
From Pietro: âIt turns out that one of the image stacks from the lab never resulted in generated movies even though 620 ghost records were added to the database. So Stall Catchers thought there were 620 movies that nobody annotated (they all had load errors).â
Pietro said that he hid those movies to correct the progress bar error and will see about reprocessing the image stack if warranted.
Pietro reports that after several manipulations we have our first pilot dataset with stroke data from Boston University ready to try on Stall Catchers. Expect to see a blog post about it soon. This data set will be a bit different, but we catchers should adapt OK. Pietro will explain in the blog post, but I understand the resolution is only about a fourth what weâre used to, and the frame rate had to be slowed to be the same as our regular movies (so not as smooth). But the main difference is that the vessels are all flattened on top of each other (so no change in depth) which might help in some ways, and maybe confuse in others.
OK, rather than âNews from the Admin Team,â this is more like âModerator Going Out on a Limbâ - in this case to provide some non-expert insight(?) to Gaalecâs chat box question. Iâm barely competent to provide short replies in the chat, for longer responses as this seemed to merit I need more âroom.â
Gaalec, asked if we might be seeing and annotating videos of non-mouse (e.g., human or monkey) capillaries in Stall Catchers at some time. Short answer, I donât know, However, until a true Admin elects to respond, I can at least provide some food for thought.
To get these images from the living mice, they have had little glass-slide âwindowsâ implanted in their skulls. (They seem happy with this arrangement and not to know the difference.)
People (and monkeys) would probably notice. Even if they chose to volunteer, I donât know as that would be acceptable at this point, or even useful, because âŚ
The multiphoton microscopy technique used to get the images only can go - if I recall correctly (which is a big if) - a few millimeters into the mouse brain. A human brain is so much bigger than the mouse brain, weâd really only be scratching the surface, literally.
OK, hopefully that feeble attempt at a reply was better than ignoring your question.
You should know, Gaalec, that the team (HCI and Cornell) is alert to other possible opportunities to apply the Stall Catcherâs approach elsewhere - not just to the stroke research at Boston U mentioned above in this discussion thread, but perhaps for other maladies in other organs - like the heart, even. The heart capillaries would be tough to image since, unlike the brain, the heartâs always on the move (we hope), but those grad students nowadays can be pretty crafty!
Admin noted messages in this morningâs chat about site issues. Sounds likely related to the security certificate renewal again. Pietro should have access within 20 minutes and will hopefully get things resolved quickly thereafter.
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