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@INPROCEEDINGS{Hagemeier:185674,
author = {Hagemeier, Björn and Bücker, Oliver and Giesler, André
and Saini, Rajveer and Schuller, Bernd},
title = {{A} {W}orkflow for {P}olarized {L}ight {I}maging {U}sing
{UNICORE} {W}orkflow {S}ervices},
volume = {26},
address = {Jülich},
publisher = {Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH Zentralbibliothek, Verlag},
reportid = {FZJ-2014-07099},
isbn = {978-3-95806-004-3},
series = {IAS Series},
pages = {1-14},
year = {2014},
comment = {UNICORE Summit 2014},
booktitle = {UNICORE Summit 2014},
abstract = {Understanding the anatomical structure of the human brain
on the level of single nerve fibers is one of the most
challenging tasks in neuroscience nowadays. In order to
understand the connectivity of brain regions (affecting the
brain function) on the one hand and to study
neurodegenerative diseases on the other hand, a detailed
three-dimensional map of nerve fibers has to be created. One
technique applied to histological sections of postmortem
brains is Polarized Light Imaging which allows the study of
brain regions with a resolution at sub-millimeter scale. It
is based on an optical property referred to as birefringence
of myelin which surrounds the axons of nerve fibers.
Therefore about 1500 slices, each 70 micron thick, of the
post-mortem brain are imaged with a microscopic device using
polarized light.The images of brain slices are processed
with a chain of tools for calibration, independent component
analysis, enhanced analysis, stitching and segmentation.
These tools have been integrated in a UNICORE workflow,
exploiting many of the workflow system features, such as
control structures and human interaction. Prior to the
introduction of the UNICORE workflow system, the tools
involved were run manually by their respective developers.
Thus, once one step in the process was finished, the
developer of the next tool in the chain would retrieve the
data and run his tools on the output of the former. This
manual approach led to delays in the entire process.The
introduction of the UNICORE workflow system for this
particular use case resulted in several benefits. First of
all, the results are easier to reproduce now, as fewer
manual steps are involved. Secondly, the makespan of the
entire workflow could be reduced to hours rather than weeks,
because of the almost fully automated workflow. Lastly, only
the automated approach will allow for the timely analysis of
a large number of brain slices that are expected to be
available in the near future.This workflow is interesting
from the technical point of view, as it takes UNICORE and
its workflow system to the limits. Workarounds were required
for some peculiarities of the workflow system. For example,
in order to use results of one workflow job as input in the
next job, the workflow system usually copies this data to
the central workflow storage before copying it into the
working directory of the next job. The amount of data for a
single brain slice is on the order of magnitude of up to
1TB, with intermediate results at the same scale. Thus, the
total amount of data easily adds up to several TB of data
movement within the workflow, which can and should be
avoided.This paper will describe the situation as of version
6.6.0 of the workflow system. Results of this work have been
incorporated in subsequent versions starting with 7.0.0.
However, some of the approaches for processing large sets of
data used here will still apply in future versions of the
UNICORE system.},
month = {Jun},
date = {2014-06-24},
organization = {UNICORE Summit 2014, Leipzig
(Germany), 24 Jun 2014 - 24 Jun 2014},
cin = {JSC},
cid = {I:(DE-Juel1)JSC-20090406},
pnm = {412 - Grid Technologies and Infrastructures (POF2-412) /
411 - Computational Science and Mathematical Methods
(POF2-411)},
pid = {G:(DE-HGF)POF2-412 / G:(DE-HGF)POF2-411},
typ = {PUB:(DE-HGF)8 / PUB:(DE-HGF)7},
url = {https://juser.fz-juelich.de/record/185674},
}