Patent ID: 7200252

Claim:
A method for identifying objects of interest in a stained biological specimen; the objects of interest being identified from normal cells and background areas of the biological specimen, the method comprising: obtaining an image of the biological specimen, the image of the biological specimen comprising pixels, each of the pixels being defined by a first component, a second component, and a third component; storing pixel values representing the first, second and third components in a memory; forming a complement of the first component, the second component, and the third component for each of the pixels; executing instructions in a computing device that operate on said stored pixel values so as to transform the image of the biological specimen to produce a transformed image, the image of the biological specimen being transformed by calculating, for each of the pixels, a sum of a plurality of products, the plurality of products being between (a) a first coefficient and the complement of the first component for a pixel to be transformed; (b) a second coefficient and the complement of the second component for the pixel to be transformed; and (c) a third coefficient and the complement of the third component for the pixel to be transformed, whereby the transformed image assists in identification of the objects of interest, if any, in the biological specimen.