Zebrafish embryo and larvae research

DanioScope

If you are interested in a scope of zebrafish embryo and larvae parameters such as embryo activity, cardiovascular measurements, morphology, and gut and blood flow, then DanioScope is just what you need.

  • Automated detection of zebrafish embryos (in chorion) – minimizing manual interference

  • Can handle situations in which the animal slightly moves by combining multiple measures on the animal at the different locations

  • Acquire data in a batch from list of videos

DanioScope
 

Save time with DanioScope

DanioScope allows you to test many animals simultaneously. This increases the throughput of your research significantly, and ultimately saves you a lot of time when it comes to preparing your experiment, acquiring data, and analyzing the results.

Watch the video to learn more about DanioScope.

 


Zebrafish embryo activity

Zebrafish develop quickly: within a matter of hours internal organs start to show. Also, movements such as tail flicks, coilings, and convulsive behavior start as early as 17 hours after fertilization. These behaviors are of interest especially in toxicological studies and pharmacology, as they reflect the development of the nervous system. Additionally, these readouts are highly susceptible to pharmacological manipulation.

DanioScope non-invasively measures these behaviors – simply use a video of one or more zebrafish embryos. DanioScope automatically recognizes each embryo (within their chorion). Then it measures their activity. If floating occurs you can simply adjust the location of the measurements during the experiment. DanioScope reports back the following parameters:

  • Burst activity – percentage of time (from total measurement duration) the embryo was moving
  • Inactivity – percentage of time of inactivity (100% - burst activity).
  • Burst duration – total time spent active (sum of all movement durations)
  • Inactivity duration – total time spent inactive
  • Burst count – number of times the embryo moved
  • Burst count / per minute – number of movements per minute

Compared to manually counting activity bursts, DanioScope can save you 75% experiment time .

 


Cardiology measurements in zebrafish larvae

The heart is the first organ to develop in zebrafish, and development is similar to the human heart, both good reasons for zebrafish to be an interesting model in cardiology research.

The zebrafish cardiac system is assessed by measuring the heart rate or inter-beat interval. Traditional methods include manual counting (using a stopwatch), using a micro pressure system, Laser Doppler microscopy, or electrocardiograms. These methods are labor-intensive, time-consuming, and require specific training to perform.

Video based assessment of heart rate and inter-beat intervals is far less labor intensive. After indicating the heart area in the video imported in DanioScope, it automatically calculates the number of beats per second (BPS) and beats per minute (BPM).

This method can save you up to half the time compared to manual methods .

DanioScope cardiology measurements
 


Blood (and gut) flow

Heart malfunctions might not always be evident in heart rate data. In that case, blood flow measurements are a valuable addition to a study.

Blood flow can be measured using hand counting methods that often require labor-intensive and time-consuming fluorescence labeling techniques. DanioScope uses video analysis to measure the flow in a blood vessel. In addition, it can measure gut flow in a similar fashion.

To measure flow, you select (a part of) the blood vessel or the part of the gut, from wall to wall, in your video image. Changes in pixels on a frame-by-frame basis is used to measure flow. The blood or gut flow is presented as an activity percentage.

 
DanioScope flow
 


Customer quote

"In general, whenever I had a problem everything was sorted out quickly and effectively, with no ridiculous extra charges, as I experience with other suppliers. Big thanks to all team of Noldus."

Dr. K. Nohejlova|Charles University, Czech Republic

 


DanioScope morphology

Morphology measurements

Besides dynamic measurements, DanioScope also allows you to easily monitor the morphology of your zebrafish. You can upload images or take snapshots from videos to monitor changes in morphology.

With intuitive drawing tools you can define distances or areas you are interested in, and after calibration DanioScope will measure lengths and surfaces automatically. This way you can easily determine tail length, eye size, and pericardial area. Or any other measurement, because you can define your own!

By images from different time point, you can easily monitor growth and malformations over time.

 


Software

After data acquisition, DanioScope offers options for data selection, visualization, and analysis. You can also easily export raw data for further analysis in your statistical program of choice.

DanioScope is suited to support high-speed videos (over 60 fps), and can handle a wide range of video formats.

 
DanioScope screenshot 3
 


danioscope embryo larvae illustration microscope

Recording with a microscope

If you have a C or CS camera mount with your microscope, Noldus can provide a high quality camera. This camera ensures that your recording is optimal for usage with DanioScope.



References

 
 


Relevant blogs

Using zebrafish as an early warning system of neurotoxic substances

Using zebrafish as an early warning system of neurotoxic substances

How can we use a zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryo model to detect possible neurotoxic chemical mixtures that are difficult to detect with normal chemical analyses?
Seizing fish: a high-throughput screen for novel antiepileptic drugs

Seizing fish: a high-throughput screen for novel antiepileptic drugs

The lab of Prof. Richard Baines investigates how the electrical development of neurons is regulated. His research was long based on the larvae of fruitfly, but the lab recently started using zebrafish larvae.
Tracking zebrafish in 3D

Tracking zebrafish in 3D

Recognizing the lack of hands-on education, Dr. Kalueff has started organizing zebrafish behavioral neuroscience and phenotyping workshops. The workshops ran just before and after the SfN annual meeting, October 2012.
 
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