Computer-assisted image analysis of silver staining in normal and leukemic bone marrow

Computer-assisted image analysis was used to quantitate the amount of silver staining in interphase nuclei of bone marrow cells from acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) patients. When we compared the data obtained for the interphase nuclei with that obtained for the metaphase spreads, we found a strong correlation between the fraction of bone-marrow metaphases stained positively with silver, the average number of silver-positive nucleolus organizer regions per metaphase, and the amount of silver staining in the interphase nuclei. Computer-assisted image analysis of interphase nuclei can be used, therefore, to differentiate normal from ALL bone-marrow samples.