Boulder Laboratory for 3-Dimensional Electron Microscopy of Cells

MTSMOOTH(1)							   MTSMOOTH(1)

NAME
	mtsmooth - to smooth a model of MTs

SYNOPSIS
	mtsmooth

DESCRIPTION
  MTSMOOTH will take a model of tracked microtubules and smooth the
  trajectory of each MT independently.  It will make a much nicer
  model for presentation than any kind of transformations will.
  However, it will not necessarily preserve the spacing between MTs on
  any given section.  Such a smoothed model should thus NOT be used for
  any kind of analysis that depends on the separations between MTs.
  
  The program operates by considering each point of each MT in turn.
  It fits a polynomial to the nearest N points to that point in the MT,
  where N is a number specified by the user.  (More precisely, it fits
  a polynomial to X coordinates as a function of Z, and a separate
  polynomial to the Y coordinates as a function of Z.)  It replaces the
  given point with the coordinates of the fitted polynomial at that
  position in Z.  The order of the polynomials (1 for a straight line,
  2 for a parabola, etc.,) is also chosen by the user.
  
  Entries to the program:
  
  Name of input model file 
  
  Name of output model file
  
  Number of points to fit polynomials to, and the order of the
  polynomials.  Fitting to 5 or 7 points, with an order of 2, is
  recommended.
  
  Minimum object length for fitting polynomials of the chosen order;
  objects shorter than this will be fit with a simple straight line.
  A value of 5 is recommended for this parameter.
  
HISTORY
  Written by David Mastronarde, 1/13/93