P. Hufnagl¹, T. Schrader^{1, 2}, M.G. Rojo³, A. Laurinavicius⁴, G. Kayser⁵, Y. Yagi⁶

¹Institute for Pathology, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany, ²University of Applied Sciences Brandenburg, Brandenburg, Germany, ³Servicio de Anatomia Patologica, Hospital General de Ciudad Real. ⁴National Centre of Pathology, Vilnius, Lithuania, ⁵Institute of Pathology, University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany, ⁶Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, United States

All manufacturers of slide scanners are invited to participate in the Second International Scanner Contest (ISC) in Berlin, under the auspices of the European Society of Pathology, German Society of Pathology, and the Berufsverband Deutscher Pathologen e.V. (German Professional Organization of Pathologists).

The 1^st ESC was a great success for manufacturers as well as for pathologists and other users. The results have influenced the ongoing development of scanners and the understanding of image quality and evaluation procedures. This contest helps to identify and clarify the specific requirements of image acquisition and digitalization in diagnostic pathology and initiates innovative discussions between developers, vendors and users.

Formerly established and recently re-evaluated criteria will increase the value of the contest, which may support customers to find the appropriate scanner for their specific tasks. Furthermore, the 2^nd ISC will serve the manufacturers as a benchmark.

Schedule & Locations

 The contest consists of two phases as listed below.

Phase 1: Event of 2nd ISC in Berlin 

• Venue: Berlin Congress Center
• Schedule is linked to the 12th Annual Meeting of the Berufsverband Deutscher Pathologen e.V. (German Professional Organization of Pathologists) and the 96^th Annual Meeting of the German Society of Pathology, May 31^st – June 3^rd, 2012

?      May 29^th -30^th, 2012: Scanning of slides in different disciplines (see below)

?      May 31^st – June 3^rd, 2012: Evaluation of the virtual slides by pathologists attending the 12th        meeting, preliminary evaluation and presentation of first results during a dedicated session.

• Comment: Scanning takes place under supervision of referees. The contest room will be open to a restricted number of staff from each participating company between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. only. Catering for the participants will be provided.

Phase 2: Presentation of results, award ceremony 

Report from 2^nd ISC 

• Venue: Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista, in Venice, Italy
• Schedule is linked to the 11th European Congress on Telepathology and 5th International Congress on Virtual Microscopy, on June 6^th to 9^th 2012

Results & Award Ceremony 

• Venue: Prague Congress Centre, Prague, Czech Republic
• Schedule is linked to the 24th European Congress of Pathology, on Sept. 8^th to13^th, 2012

Contest Areas

The following table gives an overview of the planned domains of the 2^nd International Scanner Contest:

General rules

Each company is invited to participate in any of the offered contests with one or more scanners. The organizing committee provides all glass slides. Independent referees who will be responsible for the handling of the slide series and the time measurements supervise the contest room.  The participating companies may participate at the contest with several different scanners. These scanners may be identical or of different types. The results will be analyzed and displayed separately if different scanners are used.  The participants are allowed to review and comment the evaluated results.

Evaluation of the results

The organizing scientists will supervise the evaluation process. Beside the evaluation criteria further parameters will be documented such as:

• Scanning time for the test sets of High quality, Fluorescence
• File size of resulting images
• Number of scans failed/ broken slides/ software crashes
• Additional technical parameters and capabilities

For the evaluation and presentation of results see http://scanner-contest.charite.de.

All involved parties are welcome to propose additional evaluation procedures.

Participants

Currently we have received completed registrations from seven vendors with nine devices overall. Two further vendors have announced their participation. Participants originate from Asia, Europe and North America. The ISC proves to be the global forum for Slide Scanner evaluation and benchmarking.

Registration for the 2012 contest is still open! 

Interested Slide Scanning vendors are invited to participate with their devices in the contest to evaluate and proof their individual strengths. Please register via online registration form: http://scanner-contest.charite.de/en/news/online_registration/