Search

The nucleator is a method to estimate the volume of a particle, i.e., a compact subset of R³, which is widely used in Stereology. it is based on geometric sampling and known to be unbiased. However, the prediction of the variance of this estimator is non-trivial and depends on the underlying sampling scheme. We propose well established tools from quasi-Monte Carlo integration to address this problem. in particular, we show how the theory of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces can be used for variance prediction and how the variance of estimators based on the nucleator idea can be reduced using lattice (or lattice-like) points. We illustrate and test our results on various examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The nucleator is a design unbiased method of local stereology for estimating the volume of a bounded object. The only information required lies in the intersection of the object with an isotropic random ray emanating from a fixed point (called the pivotal point) associated with the object. For instance, the volume of a neuron can be estimated from a random ray emanating from its nucleolus. The nucleator is extensively used in biosciences because it is efficient and easy to apply. The estimator variance can be reduced by increasing the number of rays. In an earlier paper a systematic sampling design was proposed, and theoretical variance predictors were derived, for the corresponding volume estimator. Being the only variance predictors hitherto available for the nucleator, our basic goal was to check their statistical performance by means of Monte Carlo resampling on computer reconstructions of real objects. As a plus, the empirical distribution of the volume estimator revealed statistical properties of practical relevance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is shown that, for a three dimensional particle (namely an arbitrary compact domain with piecewise smooth boundary in ℝ3) the mean wedge volume defined on a given pivotal section is equal to the average nucleator estimator of the particle volume defined on that section. Further, if the particle is convex and it contains the pivotal point, then the flower area of a given pivotal section equals the average surfactor estimator defined on that section. These results are intended to throw some light on the standing conjecture that the functional defined on a pivotal section according to the invariator has a unique general expression. As a plus, the former result leads to a computational formula for the mean wedge volume of a convex polygon which is much simpler than the one published recently, and it is valid whether the fixed pivotal point is interior or exterior to the particle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]