Automatic processing and interpretation of DNA distributions: Comparison of several techniques

Abstract

There exist a large number of apparently different methods for interpreting the distribution of DNA content in a population of cells as measured by an impulse cytophotometer (FMF). Equations are derived to provide a model of the observed numbers of cells with a given DNA content. Methods are described to compute the “ideal” distribution of cells necessary to find the number of cells in G 1, S and G 2 + M phase. A comparison is made of several standard methods for computing the cell age distribution. The methods are shown to be formally nearly equivalent and to give similar results when applied to an in vitro control study.