{
  "id": 17832929,
  "title": "MaCADEMIA: a software toolbox for single-molecule fluorescence image quantification",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/11/02/macademia-a-software-toolbox-for-single-molecule-fluorescence-image",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-11-02T00:00:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "bioRxiv",
    "slug": "biorxiv",
    "url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.30.763064v1?rss=1"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Single-molecule localisation microscopy (SMLM) is a cutting-edge technique in molecular and cellular biology that belongs to the wider category of super-resolution microscopy. One key advantage of SMLM is its ability to provide detailed quantitative information, not just spatial data, such as copy number, stoichiometry, molecular interactions, and dynamics within living cells. Although the requisite hardware for SMLM has become relatively easy to set up, image analysis can still be quite complex, with much of the functionality scattered across various specialized software tools.\n\nTo address this issue, researchers have introduced MaCADEMIA (Matlab Computational Analysis of Diffusion, Emitter Molecular Intensity and Abundance), a streamlined and robust toolbox of MATLAB functions. This comprehensive package, along with its accompanying documentation, facilitates the extraction of quantitative single-molecule data from fluorescence imaging experiments. MaCADEMIA stands out for its capability to achieve precise localisation, with an error as low as 0.5 pixels Root mean squared error (RMSE), even in a range of signal-to-noise (SNR) conditions. Moreover, it consistently matches or surpasses the performance of 14 other leading methods.\n\nThe MaCADEMIA workflow offers a seamless process for analyzing quantitative data, including molecular counting and stoichiometry determination through stepwise photobleaching analysis, mobility measurement via mean squared displacement, colocalisation analysis, and absolute protein copy number quantification using three-dimensional cellular models. This integrated approach makes MaCADEMIA a valuable resource for researchers working with SMLM data, enabling them to efficiently extract meaningful insights from their experiments.",
  "summary": "Single-molecule localisation microscopy (SMLM) is a powerful tool in molecular and cellular biology and part of the broad umbrella of super-resolution microscopy. A distinct feature of SMLM, is its capacity for deep quantification, beyond just spatial information, to copy number, stoichiometry, molecular interaction and dynamics in living cells. The hardware required is increasingly…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}