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INTRODUCTION
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| WinCELL is an image analysis system specifically designed for wood cells analysis. It can quantify the changes in wood structure over annual rings. | |
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Anatomical wood cell analysis is an alternative to wood density analysis with x-rays (as done with WinDENDRO). Wood density, color, mechanical and chemical properties are in effect related to wood structure which in turns is related to climate. By measuring the radial cells (tracheids) size, distribution and their proportion to walls, wood quality can be assessed.
WinCELL measures wood cell morphology on thin wood slices cut with a microtome or, for larger cells like earlywood vessels of deciduous species, directly on wood surfaces*. Wood cells morphological data can be measured per annual ring in one or more images per ring with the aid of XLCell, a companion program for data post-processing and visualization. Image analysers not made specifically for wood cells measurement are not usually able to produce data suited for dendrochronology studies. These systems lack some knowledge about annual tree rings formation and the structure of their cells (to compute the ring width for example) so they don't know how measurements are done in this field. WinCELL has this kind of know-how built-in. It knows, for example, that a wall between two adjacent cells must be split in two to compute the cells length and earlywood or ring width. Its versatile settings allow to analyse different wood species (vessels of deciduous and radial row of conifer tracheids). It supports different automatic and interactive analysis modes. The latter allows you to select rows of cells to analyse them in a way that mimics the traditional trachedoid** method. WinCELL handles incomplete cells, those truncated by image boundary, so that they have no effects on the average cell measurements. *With proper image acquisition device and sample preparation. |
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IMAGE ACQUISITION
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| Recent developments in high-quality affordable digital cameras have made anatomical wood cell analysis more accessible than ever. | |
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SAMPLE PREPARATION
Wood cell analysis is usually done on thin wood slices cut with a microtome from core segments. Staining is sometime used to enhance lumen-wall contrasts. With proper preparation and optics, the larger vessels can be analysed directly from wood surfaces. |
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MICROSCOPE To acquire images of microtomed samples, a microscope with a receptacle tube for a camera attachment and a C-mount adapter (sold by microscope manufacturers) is required. |
| CAMERA WinCELL can analyse images acquired with digital or analog video cameras. The models sold by Regent Instruments are of scientific quality grade and have a standard C-mount thread which allows them to be installed on a microscope. We sell three models ranging from 1 to 6 Megapixels (millions of pixels). These cameras can also be placed directly above a piece of wood (with optional lenses). WinCELL can also acquire images from optical scanners when the sample surface is well prepared to analyse larger cells (vessels) from such images (please inquire about conditions before purchasing). Cameras sold by Regent can be interfaced to computers via the a fast Firewire (IEEE-1394) or USB2.0 connection. WinCELL is TWAIN compatible, meaning it can acquire images from many camera or scanner models. |
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| IMAGE ACQUISITION FROM WinCELL Simply click an icon in WinCELL's window and it starts displaying images live (or semi-live depending on the camera model) on the computer screen while you adjust the microscope or the sample position. You can also set the image parameters (size, color, filtering) while the image is displayed. To digitize and analyze the image, simply click a button in the camera interface window. |
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| IMAGE ANALYSIS IN THE WinCELL PROGRAM The WinCELL program is available in two versions, Regular and Pro. A comparison of both is given in WinCELL Measurements and WinCELL Features. |
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| To learn more about WinCELL click the following links or you can download our WinCELL brochure (1.2 MB). | |