PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Reem Khalil
AU  - Sadok Kallel
AU  - Ahmad Farhat
AU  - Paweł Dłotko
TI  - Topological Sholl Descriptors for Neuronal Clustering and Classification
AID  - 10.1101/2021.01.15.426800
DP  - 2021 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 2021.01.15.426800
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/01/17/2021.01.15.426800.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/01/17/2021.01.15.426800.full
AB  - Variations in neuronal morphology among cell classes, brain regions, and animal species are thought to underlie known heterogeneities in neuronal function. Thus, accurate quantitative descriptions and classification of large sets of neurons is essential for functional characterization. However, unbiased computational methods to classify groups of neurons are currently scarce. We introduce a novel, robust, and unbiased method to study neuronal morphologies. We develop mathematical descriptors that quantitatively characterize structural differences among neuronal cell types and thus classify them. Each descriptor that is assigned to a neuron is a function of a distance from the soma with values in real numbers or more general metric spaces. Standard clustering methods enhanced with detection and metric learning algorithms are then used to objectively cluster and classify neurons. Our results illustrate a practical and effective approach to the classification of diverse neuronal cell types, with the potential for discovery of putative subclasses of neurons.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.