High-throughput flow cytometry experiments produce hundreds of large multivariate samples of cellular characteristics. These samples require specialized processing to obtain clinically meaningful measurements. A major component of this processing is a form of cell subsetting known as gating. Manual gating is time-consuming and subjective. Good automatic and semi-automatic gating algorithms are very beneficial to high-throughput flow cytometry. We develop a statistical procedure, named curvHDR, for automatic and semi-automatic gating. The method combines the notions of significant high negative curvature regions and highest density regions and has the ability to adapt well to human-perceived gates. The underlying principles apply to dimension of arbitrary size, although we focus on dimensions up to three. Accompanying software, compatible with contemporary flow cytometry informatics, is developed.
Ulrike Naumann, George Luta, Matthew P. Wand