MBF Bioscience Releases our File Format to Embrace FAIR Data Standards
For Immediate Release:
Williston, VT (September 25, 2020)—To support the scientific community’s movement toward a more open and collaborative climate, MBF Bioscience is making their digital reconstruction file format, the Neuromorpholocial File Specification open and available to all researchers.
MBF Bioscience has a long history of supporting openness and collaboration in neuroscience research. MBF Bioscience’s file format has evolved for over 30 years, influenced by leading neuroscientists, new microscopic imaging technologies, and computational advances. During this progression, MBF Bioscience has continually augmented morphological modeling elements for performance, modeling accuracy, and analytical potential. Encoded in the well-recognized and readable XML format, modeling parameters specify microscopic neuroanatomies in a calibrated 3D coordinate system with appropriate units. The XML files can easily be viewed and parsed in a variety of software platforms (e.g., MATLAB, Python, R, etc.).
President and co-founder of MBF Bioscience, Jack Glaser says, “We hope this publication encourages the reuse of these rich data files for alternative analysis or reproduction of derived conclusions. This open specification encourages and enables the reuse of unique and important experimental data collected by users of our software.”
MBF Bioscience has also implemented development and design methodologies to ensure that our Neuromorpholocial File Specification complies with Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) data standards. Abiding by FAIR data standards ensures the accessibility of original experimental data and its provenance, and facilitates inspecting, reproducing, and extending research.
Publishing this open and FAIR Neuromorpholocial File Specification data file specification benefits research in neuroscience, and in fields beyond, by increasing accessibility and sustainability of anatomical and morphological data. MBF Bioscience has submitted a publication, A comprehensive, FAIR file format for neuroanatomical structure modeling, to Neuroinformatics Special Issue: Building the NeuroCommons. It describes key elements of the file format, and details their relevant structural advantages. If you are interested in learning more, this paper is now publicly available on Biorxiv.
MBF Bioscience also recognizes the importance of community contributions, and a plan is in place to create an open community strategy through emails and existing discussion forums.
You can find the neuromorphological file format specification at www.mbfbioscience.com/filespecification. MBF Bioscience will continue to update and document the file specification to accommodate added or modified data elements.
In this webinar, MBF Bioscience demonstrates how to use MicroFile+ to convert microscopy image data from various proprietary file formats into the standardized OME-TIFF and JPEG2000 formats.
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About MBF Bioscience: MBF Bioscience integrates the world’s leading microscope systems with our revolutionary quantitative imaging and visualization software to accelerate research in the fields of: stereology, neuron and microvasculature reconstruction, vascular analysis, worm tracking, brain mapping and big image data management in medical research and education.
Since 1988, MBF Bioscience has forged a rich history of creating innovative products to empower biological researchers with the quantitative analysis tools they need to obtain accurate, unbiased results. With offices in North America, Europe, Japan, and China, MBF Bioscience has helped researchers across the globe publish over 15,000 peer-reviewed papers in peer-reviewed journals. MBF Bioscience partners with the NIH and distinguished scientists across the world to continue their commitment to neuroscience research with their software technology, and also in the fields of stem cells, pulmonology, oncology, and toxicology. For more information visit www.mbfbioscience.com or follow MBF Bioscience on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
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Media Contact:
Pasang Sherpa
Marketing Manager
1-802-288-9290/ pasang@mbfbioscience.com
