Morphometric Evaluation of Preeclamptic Placenta Using Light Microscopic Images

Deficient trophoblast invasion and anomalies in placental development generally lead to preeclampsia (PE) but the inter-relationship between placental function and morphology in PE still remains unknown. The aim of this study was to evaluate the morphometric features of placental villi and capillaries in preeclamptic and normal placentae. The study included light microscopic images of placental tissue sections of 40 preeclamptic and 35 normotensive pregnant women. Preprocessing and segmentation of these images were performed to characterize the villi and capillaries. Fisher's linear discriminant analysis (FLDA), hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA), and principal component analysis (PCA) were applied to identify the most significant placental (morphometric) features from microscopic images. A total of 10 morphometric features were extracted, of which the villous parameters were significantly altered in PE. FLDA identified 5 highly significant morphometric features (>90% overall discrimination accuracy). Two large subclusters were clearly visible in HCA based dendrogram. PCA returned three most significant principal components cumulatively explaining 98.4% of the total variance based on these 5 significant features. Hence, quantitative microscopic evaluation revealed that placental morphometry plays an important role in characterizing PE, where the villous is the major component that is affected.