  Micro-CT images of the renal arteries of intact rat kidneys, which had their
vasculature injected with the contrast agent polymer Microfil, were
characterized. Measurement of inter-branch segment properties and the
hierarchical structure of the vessel trees were computed by an automated
algorithmic approach. The perfusion territories of the different kidneys, as
well as the local diameters of the segmented vasculature were mapped onto the
representative structures and visually explored. Various parameters were
compared in order to outline key geometrical properties, properties which were
shown to not have a wide range of inter-specimen variation. It is shown that
the fractal scaling in non-symmetric branching reveals itself differently, than
in symmetric branching (e.g., in the lung the mean bronchial diameters at each
generation are closely related). Also, perfused tissue is shown to have very
little inter-specimen variation and therefore could be used in future studies
related to characterizing various disease states of tissues and organs based on
vascular branching geometry.
