NIH Image to ImageJ: 25 years of image analysis

Caroline A Schneider, Wayne S Rasband, Kevin W Eliceiri
2012 Nature Methods  
For the past twenty five years the NIH family of imaging software, NIH Image and ImageJ have been pioneers as open tools for scientific image analysis. We discuss the origins, challenges and solutions of these two programs, and how their history can serve to advise and inform other software projects. The last fifty years have seen tremendous technological advances, few greater than in the area of scientific computing. One of the fields where scientific computing has made particular inroads has
more » ... een in the area of biological imaging. The modern computer coupled to advances in microscopy technology is enabling new frontiers in biology to be visualized. While the role of the optical technologies and methods have been well documented, the role of scientific imaging software and its origins have been seldom discussed in any historical context. This is due in part to the relative youth of the field, the wide variety of imaging software tools available, sheer diversity of sub fields and specialized tools, and the constant creation and evolution of new tools. Yet in this great diversity and change, one software tool has not only survived but thrived. The scientific image analysis program, ImageJ 1, 2 , known in previous incarnations as NIH Image 3 , is an early pioneer in image analysis. Yet 25 years later the program not only persists but continues to push and drive the field. Interestingly, the program has done so not by continuously reinventing itself but instead by sticking to a core set of design principles that have allowed it to become a modern image processing platform and yet retain an interface that a user from over 20 years ago would recognize and readily use. Given the great success and impact of ImageJ one would expect that this application was a software initiative with official backing and formal planning by a central funding body. Despite its original name, NIH image, and its home at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for over 30 years in some form, ImageJ is a product of need and user driven development and collaboration rather than a specific plan by the NIH to create it at the onset. # Corresponding author: Kevin W. Eliceiri, eliceiri@wisc.edu. Author contributions CAS and KWE wrote the manuscript based on interviews with WR, with input from members of their research groups and software projects.
doi:10.1038/nmeth.2089 pmid:22930834 pmcid:PMC5554542 fatcat:4vy47z777nawhcpuwzbf6mcosi