RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Plaque Size Tool: an automated plaque analysis tool for simplifying and standardising bacteriophage plaque morphology measurements
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2021.04.12.439404
DO 10.1101/2021.04.12.439404
A1 Ellina Trofimova
A1 Paul R Jaschke
YR 2021
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/04/12/2021.04.12.439404.abstract
AB Bacteriophage plaque size measurement is essential for phage characterisation, but their manual size estimation requires a considerable amount of time and effort. In order to ease the work of phage researchers, we have developed an automated command-line application called Plaque Size Tool (PST) that can detect plaques of different morphology on the images of Petri dishes and measure plaque area and diameter. Plaque size measurements using PST showed no difference to those obtained with manual plaque size measurement in Fiji, indicating future results using PST are backwards compatible with prior measurements in the literature. PST can be applied to a range of lytic bacteriophages producing oval-shaped plaques, including bull’s-eye morphology. The application can also be used for titer calculation if most of the plaques are stand-alone. As laboratory automation becomes more commonplace, standardised and flexible open-source analytical tools like PST will be important parts of biofoundry and cloud lab bacteriophage workflows.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.