I am beginning an investigation of imaging equipment suitable for the following
needs in a biochemistry/cell physiology lab:
1) imaging of transmissive media (autoradiograms and western blots) for both
archival purposes and also for semi-quantitative analysis (densitometry)
2) imaging of reflective media (western blots and glossy prints) for archival,
semi-quantitative analysis, and figure composition. Figures are currently
output to a thermal dye-sublimation printer, or a digital film recorder for
making slides.
3) imaging of photographic negatives and slides for archival and figure
composition.
I wonder if anyone here has had similar needs in the past, and what equipment
they found to satisfy their needs?
We currently have a BioRad GS-670 Densitometer, however like all equipment from
BioRad it is extraordinarily overpriced. I have been considering commercially
available alternatives such as the Microtek Scannmaker III, the UMAX Vista-S12
(with transparent media adapter), or the UMAX Gemini D16. Opinions?
While I believe these imaging systems may be adequate for figure composition
and image archival, I am not certain about this. Furthermore, I do not know of
any decent freely available or commercially available software that can perform
quantitative analysis on these images. To date, the only image analysis I have
needed to perform is densitometry by either profile or volume analysis.
If I can pick anyone's brain out there, I'd be very grateful.
Kane L. Schaphorst
Indiana University
