The Laboratory of Plant Systematics has announced the release of Carnoy 1.0. It’s an image analysis program developed to help scientists carry out measurements on digital images, especially on micrographs obtained from light or electron microscopes.
Carnoy measures the length and surface area of regular and irregular objects, according to the developers. It can also do automated particle analysis — counting and measuring. The software supports BMP, PICT, Photoshop, JPEG, GIF, PNG, SGI, TGA, TIFF and QuickTime image files, and can also convert between the different file types.
The measurements themselves can be annotated, then exported to a tab-delimited file for further analysis. Carnoy also employs a one-click calibration option that enables users to click on a scale bar, enter its length, and have measurements calculated on micrographs accordingly.
Carnoy’s developers explained that the software has been developed for a variety of scientific fields, including taxonomy, morphology, ecology, physiology, molecular cell biology, agricultural sciences, paleontology, archaeology, and more.
The software requires a Mac running Mac OS X and a display with 1024×768 pixel resolution or higher is also recommended. Carnoy 1.0 is distributed as US$15 shareware.