Offline Sorter V3 and CinePlex V3 Newsletter

New Offline Sorter Version 3 Released

The world standard in spike sorting software just got better!

Plexon has just released version 3 of our Offline Sorter spike sorting software, with even more powerful, easy to use tools for viewing and sorting your extracellular spike action potentials.

 

 

 

 

New Sorting Features

• Enhanced automatic sorting methods with systematic scanning through parameter space and graphs displaying the sort quality metric as a function of the parameters that were varied; select the best sorting according to a selected sort quality metric
• Automatic sort scan results for each channel can be saved to and loaded from .SCAN files. This, together with the new batch mode scan commands, will allow the running of certain sorting scans over night, followed by manual reviewing and selection of the most appropriate sort for each channel
• Adaptive template sorting, with the templates changing over time to follow the waveform as it evolves
• Template vs. Time view to display how the template adapted through the file
• Box sorting (like in the Sort Client on-line MAP control software)
• Save and recall particular sorting instances for a selected channel (useful for comparisons)

 

 

 

 

 

Enhanced Batch Mode Processing

• New batch mode commands for scanning through automatic sorting parameters
• New menu item to edit batch files with a user-selected editor
• Memory of previous batch file locations
  New Quick Batch Reference showing all batch commands
• New menu item showing the log file resulting from the latest batch run.

 

 

Time Segmentation

• Divide each file into time segments and view and sort waveforms from each time segment separately
• Clusters vs. Time view to show how clusters evolve as a function of time
• Sort Quality vs. Time Segment graph to display how the sort quality changes through the file

 

Enhanced Continuous Data Handling

• Up-sampling of continuous signals, with linear or spline interpolation
• FFT view of continuous data
• Waveform detection and extraction now appropriately handles differences in voltage scales between spike waveform segments and continuous spike data

 

Improved User Interface and Displays

• New GUI interface with flexible and customizable window configurations
• Enhanced bottom Timeline View showing both continuous and waveform data simultaneously with a resizable splitter
• Mouse-over time and voltage readings in the waveform and continuous data views
• More information related to gains and voltage ranges in the Channel Parameters and File Summary views
• New Select main menu item to select the next/previous channel, unit, waveform, or time segment

Other Improvements Include

• Performance enhancements for loading data files
• Now available as a true 64-bit executable - for faster processing of large data files

Contact Plexon by phone (214-369-4957) or email for Offline Sorter v3 pricing and upgrade information

Plexon will release a new 3.0 version of the CinePlex video recording and tracking system in July. All of the core image processing and position tracking algorithms have been completely re-written and improved. In addition, many new features have been added as described below.

CinePlex v3 will run on a standard PC along with the MAP control software, and includes several new hardware pieces for timing and triggering the cameras.

The names of the software modules have also changed in CinePlex v3:

 

New v2 Software Names	Old v2 Software Names	Function
CinePlex Studio	CinePlex Capture	Video capture and position tracking
CinePlex Editor	CinePlex Markup	Viewing video and neural data simultaneously; inserting events and intervals

Faster, Lower Noise, Triggered Cameras

• Low noise AVT Stingray cameras (640x480 resolution, up to 80 frames/sec)
• Triggered video capture, for more accurate timestamping of video frames (50 microsecond accuracy)
• Removable infrared (IR) filter, for use of IR illuminator to visualize and track animal in dark environment (useful for seeing animal in low-light environment while tracking LEDs mounted on headstage)
• MJPEG and MPEG files supported - MPEG video compression results in greatly reduced file sizes

Multiple Cameras

• Record from TWO cameras simultaneously
• Run each camera at up to 80 frames/sec

New CinePlex Studio Tracking Option Features

• Both on-line and off-line position tracking - allows for adjusting image parameters after the initial video recording and re-running the tracking algorithms
• Track up to 5 colors (either different colors or all the same color)
• Create arenas of both simple and complex shapes

 

 

 

New CinePlex Behavior Option with Programmable Digital Output

• Detection and event generation when:
  • an object enters or leaves a user-defined zone in the image
  • a threshold level is crossed for an object's speed or the angle between two markers (head direction)
• Zones may be centered around objects being tracked - dynamic zones for use in social interaction studies, behavioral training paradigms, etc.
• 24 programmable, event triggerable hardware digital output lines (screw terminal)
• Logical AND/OR and Sequence operations on behavioral event variables to create complex events. E.g., create event and generate a digital output when an object
  • enters a certain combination of zones in a particular sequence
  • enters a particular zone and has a speed greater than a particular value
  • has a vector angle over or under a specified level
• Real-time statistics and behavioral information, such as:
  • object speed
  • time spent in each zone
  • angle between two markers (head direction)

Note: the CinePlex Behavior option requires CinePlex Tracking Option to be enabled

3D Tracking in X, Y, Z space will be included in CinePlex v3.1 (Expected release date: late 2009)

Contact Plexon by phone (214-369-4957) or email for CinePlex v3 pricing and upgrade information.