Local Shape Descriptors - Bryant McGill

# Local Shape Descriptors **Aliases:** LSDs **Entity class:** Auxiliary learning method for neuron segmentation **Collection:** [[collections/Neurotech|Neurotech]] **Canonical source articles:** [[articles/The Organic-Synthetic Brain Atlas|The Organic-Synthetic Brain Atlas]] · [[articles/Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer|Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer]] ## Definition **Local Shape Descriptors (LSDs)** are learned representations of local object shape used alongside voxel-neighbor affinities for neuron-boundary detection in electron-microscopy volumes. The method forms part of the computational-connectomics lineage linking [[wiki/Jan Funke|Jan Funke]] and [[wiki/Arlo Sheridan|Arlo Sheridan]] to PRISM. PRISM's training stack includes affinity and LSD prediction, but its distinctive advance is to combine shape-derived evidence with protein-barcode identity. Local Shape Descriptors alone are not an identity barcode. ## Relationships - **Authors and lineage:** [[wiki/Arlo Sheridan|Arlo Sheridan]], [[wiki/Jan Funke|Jan Funke]], and collaborators at [[wiki/Janelia Research Campus|Janelia]] and other institutions. - **Method class:** [[wiki/Machine Learning Segmentation|machine-learning segmentation]]. - **Computational ancestry of:** [[wiki/PRISM (E11 Bio)|PRISM (E11 Bio)]]. - **Collection route:** [[collections/Neurotech|Neurotech]]. ## Sources - [Local Shape Descriptors — project and paper](https://localshapedescriptors.github.io/) - [E11 Bio — Arlo Sheridan](https://www.e11.bio/arlo-sheridan) ## Research Inferences  These entries translate the forward-looking register in [[research/Research Inferences|Research Inferences]] into ordinary wiki prose. The tier labels apply to the inference, not automatically to every factual anchor inside it. The interpretive frame comes from [[articles/Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer|Technologies for Consciousness Mapping and Transfer]] and [[articles/Mind Uploading and AI — The Host is Reusable and the Person is the Delta|Mind Uploading and AI — The Host is Reusable and the Person is the Delta]]. Collection route: [[collections/Neurotech|Neurotech]]. - **INF-0103 — Strongly indicated.** GPU-accelerated segmentation cutting reconstruction cost 10–100× means the connectome timeline is now indexed to accelerator availability. Every improvement in datacenter capacity shortens the schedule for mapping a mammalian brain, which couples neuroscience directly to the AI capital cycle.