Quantitative and automated microscopy — Where do we stand after 80 years of research?

Visual information is essential in medicine; almost all cancer is diagnosed through visual examination of tissue samples. But while the human visual system is excellent at recognizing patterns it is poor at providing reproducible quantitative data. Many tasks also require inspection of many thousands of images. Computerized image analysis has been developed ever since the first computers became available to provide quantitative data and to automate tedious tasks. Still the impact on routine pathology is limited. In this paper the historical development of the field is briefly outlined and the reasons for the limited impact so far are analyzed and some predictions are made about the future.