LSIP: Locality Sensitive Intensity Projection for 2D Mapping of High-Res 3D Images of Dendritic Spines

Biological objects at numerous scales such as tissue and cells are commonly used for study for a long time. Acquiring 3D fluorescence microscopic images and applying image processing algorithms to the acquired images are frequently used to study these biological objects. Working with 3D images is computationally expensive and difficult. Maximum intensity projection, frequently used process for 2D mapping of the 3D image, generates a disconnected layer of voxels, creating important artifacts and wrong interpretations. Here we present a method Locality Sensitive Intensity Projection(LSIP) that produces a continuous focused 2D mapping from a 3D volume while maintaining local spatial relationships. We illustrate the utilities of the proposed method by applying it in the 2D mapping of 3D confocal microscopic images of dendritic spines.