Perl Graphic Applications with Image Processing

Abstract

The Perl language is a powerful tool for creation of portable programs on a wide range of platforms. Support of the graphic user interface is not included in Perl, and is provided by several stand-alone graphical toolkits. The most popular modules are Perl-Tk and Wx, based on multi-platform libraries, correspondingly Tcl-Tk and wxWindows, both written in C. The toolkit Prima was written to provide features non-existent in the other toolkits, and it was used as a base for development of research applications with the need for both graphic interface and image processing. The target biological research comprises a study of the effects of applying various peptide-based preparations on neuron culture, with subsequent quantification of morphological changes in cells. The software provides both manual and automatic quantification, where the former depends on graphic interface functionality, and both on numerical processing. The toolkits Prima and PDL are used to demonstrate Perl capabilities in the intersection area between image processing and graphic user interface. Prima is a platform-independent Perl graphic toolkit with an object-oriented interface. Its features include an extensive set of Perlcoded widgets, a wide range of image types and conversion routines, and a visual builder. PDL is a popular numerical toolkit featuring efficient storage of numerical arrays. It contains a wide spectrum of calculating functionalities, including a set of image processing operators designed to work with two and more dimensional data. The work illustrates the usage of Prima and PDL libraries for image conversion and display.