Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41079265›Full record

ArticleProceedings of SPIE--the International Society for Optical Engineering2025

Assessment of Cell Nuclei AI Foundation Models in Kidney Pathology.

Junlin Guo, Siqi Lu, Can Cui, Ruining Deng, Tianyuan Yao, Zhewen Tao, Yizhe Lin, Marilyn Lionts, Quan Liu, Juming Xiong and 7 more

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of SPIE--the International Society for Optical Engineering, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

17 authors.

Junlin GuoDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Siqi LuDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Can CuiDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Ruining DengDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Tianyuan YaoDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Zhewen TaoDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Yizhe LinDepartment of Mathematics, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Marilyn LiontsDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Quan LiuDepartment of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Juming XiongDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Yu WangDepartment of Biostatistics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA.
Shilin ZhaoDepartment of Biostatistics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA.
Catie ChangDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Mitchell WilkesDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.
Mengmeng YinDepartment of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA.
Haichun YangDepartment of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA.
Yuankai HuoDepartment of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA.

Funding

Vanderbilt Institute for Clinical and Translational Research (VICTR) -Identifying correlates of functional immunity in SARS-CoV-2 convalescent plasmaUL1TR002243 · NCATS · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER · PI Paul A. Harris, Wesley H Self · 2017 to 2026
$130.7M
VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY CTSA FOR PEDIATRIC RESEARCHUL1RR024975 · NCRR · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY · PI BERNARD, GORDON RAPHAEL · 2007 to 2011
$45.7M
MEDICAL SCIENTIST TRAINING PROGRAMT32GM007347 · NIGMS · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY · PI WILLIAMS, CHRISTOPHER S. · 1985 to 2023
$26.3M
Postdoctoral Training in Biomedical MRI and MRST32EB001628 · NIBIB · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER · PI John C Gore · 2003 to 2026
$7.0M
Controlling Quality and Capturing Uncertainty in Advanced Diffusion Weighted MRIR01EB017230 · NIBIB · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY · PI LANDMAN, BENNETT A. · 2015 to 2024
$5.1M
AI-empowered 3D Computer Vision and Image-Omics Integration for Digital Kidney HistopathologyR01DK135597 · NIDDK · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY · PI Yuankai Huo · 2023 to 2026
$2.1M
NCATS NIH HHS UL1 TR002243NCRR NIH HHS UL1 RR024975NIBIB NIH HHS R01 EB017230NIBIB NIH HHS T32 EB001628NIDDK NIH HHS R01 DK135597NIGMS NIH HHS T32 GM007347
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Cell nuclei instance segmentation is a crucial task in digital kidney pathology. Traditional automatic segmentation methods often lack generalizability when applied to unseen datasets. Recently, the success of foundation models (FMs) has provided a more generalizable solution, potentially enabling the segmentation of any cell type. In this study, we perform a large-scale evaluation of three widely used state-of-the-art (SOTA) cell nuclei foundation models-Cellpose, StarDist, and CellViT. Specifically, we created a highly diverse evaluation dataset consisting of 2,542 kidney whole slide images (WSIs) collected from both human and rodent sources, encompassing various tissue types, sizes, and staining methods. To our knowledge, this is the largest-scale evaluation of its kind to date. Our quantitative analysis of the prediction distribution reveals a persistent performance gap in kidney pathology. Among the evaluated models, CellViT demonstrated superior performance in segmenting nuclei in kidney pathology. However, none of the foundation models are perfect; a performance gap remains in general nuclei segmentation for kidney pathology.

Indexed as

Ensemble learningFoundation modelInstance SegmentationKidney PathologyModel AgreementNuclei

Identifiers

PMID41079265
PMCPMC12512033

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.