Imaging Nomenclature

When working with 4-dimensional images, terms like 'image', 'slice' and 'section' become ambiguous, so here's a tentative nomenclature scheme for referring to an image and its parts. 

• Aperture: The pinhole opening that allows light to pass. Aperture can be measured in µm, which is constant, or Airy (A or AU), which varies with wavelength. Aperture also determines slice thickness. Note that the resolving power of a given aperture varies by wavelength, but slice thickness does not.
• Brain: All series volumes
• Channel: The part of the image containing the signal, or labeling. Each image can have multiple channels.
• File: The saved/stored/named components of an image
• Frame: One field-of-view (f-o-v). The most basic component image.
• Image: The assembled frames (Tiles + Stacks)
• Library: A collection of images from multiple brains
• Mosaic: An image composed of stitched tiles.
• Series: Set of brain sections collected at the same interval or frequency. Can also 
• Slice: One of two or more frames in register in z
• Stack: All slices in register in z
• Stitched Stack: A mosaic with x, y, and z components
• Section: A brain section.
• Slab: The z distance of a section that is imaged. Ideally, slab thickness = section thickness, but is usually less
• Tile: A component of a stitched image. Can be a frame or a stack.
• Volume: All sections of a series
• z-Step, or slice interval: The distance moved, in z before imaging the next slice. Note that Nyquist oversamping is 150%, meaning the actual number of slices is 1.5 x (slab thickness/slice thickness.