USPTO issues patent to Aperio's digital pathology system

Aperio, the global leader in providing digital pathology solutions that enhance patient safety and improve patient care, announced today that the United States Patent and Trademark Office has issued the company patent No. 7,787,674 entitled, "Systems and Methods for Viewing Three Dimensional Virtual Slides."

“This is one more milestone in our quest to enhance our intellectual property portfolio and to develop products that improve patient care.”

Digital pathology improves patient care by allowing physicians to access, analyze and share digital (whole microscope) slide images, enabling accurate and reliable diagnoses at lower costs.

The '674 patent describes novel techniques for retrieving, manipulating and viewing three dimensional (3D) image objects from three dimensional digital slide images. Unlike 2D digital histology slides that contain a single focus plane sufficient for the majority of viewing situations, 3D digital slides contain multiple, unlimited focus planes that enables digital focusing on specimens that are inherently three-dimensional in nature, such as cytology slides. An image library module allows a 3D image object to be sliced into horizontal and vertical views, skewed cross layer views and regular and irregular shaped 3D image areas for viewing by a user.

"Providing imagery data from multiple focus levels throughout the thickness of a specimen has a significant impact on the accuracy of pathological interpretations in cytology, hematopathology, small tissue biopsies, and microbiology " commented Dirk G. Soenksen, CEO of Aperio. "This is one more milestone in our quest to enhance our intellectual property portfolio and to develop products that improve patient care."

This patent extends the intellectual property rights associated with Aperio's award-winning digital pathology systems, including its patented linear array-based ScanScope™ slide scanning systems, which create seamless, true color whole slide images at giga-pixel resolution from an entire glass slide in minutes. The patented 3D viewing technology is a key component of Aperio's Spectrum Plus™ image management (PACS) software, which provides applications for storing, managing, viewing and analyzing digital slides.

Aperio's patent portfolio encompasses all of the elements that comprise a digital pathology system, including digital slide creation, data management, advanced visualization and image analysis. Aperio's intellectual property portfolio comprises over 80 issued and pending patents world-wide. Aperio is the global digital pathology leader with an installed base of more than 700 systems in over 30 countries.