System and method for viewing virtual slides

1. A computer implemented method for viewing on a virtual microscope slide client viewer virtual microscope slides stored in a persistent data storage area on a virtual microscope slide image server, wherein a stored virtual microscope slide image includes image data at a plurality of resolutions, the method comprising:

receiving at the virtual microscope slide image server a virtual microscope slide request from the virtual microscope slide client viewer, wherein the request identifies a stored virtual microscope slide having a plurality of images of the entire virtual slide, wherein each of said plurality of images of the entire virtual slide is at a different resolution, said request further identifying a particular resolution for the requested virtual microscope slide image data;

determining the requested resolution, wherein the requested resolution is not one of the plurality of resolutions in the stored virtual microscope slide;

obtaining virtual microscope slide image data from the stored virtual microscope slide image, wherein the obtained image data is from the resolution of the plurality of stored resolutions that is nearest to the requested resolution;

sending the obtained virtual slide image data to the virtual microscope slide client viewer; and

scaling the virtual slide image data at the client viewer from the stored resolution to the requested resolution.

2. A computer implemented method for viewing on a client viewer image data stored in a persistent data storage area on an image server, wherein a stored image includes image data at a plurality of resolutions and annotation data that is associated with a particular location relative to the base resolution of the image, the method comprising:

receiving at the image server an image request from the client viewer, wherein the request identifies a particular region of a stored image and a particular resolution for the requested image, wherein the requested resolution is not the base resolution;

determining that the requested region at the base resolution of the stored image has associated annotation data;

determining coordinates for said associated annotation data, said coordinates relative to said base resolution of the stored image;

scaling the associated annotation data from the base resolution to the requested resolution in accordance with said coordinates;

providing the requested image data and scaled associated annotation data on a display of the client viewer, wherein the scaled associated annotation data is presented on the display as an overlay of the requested image data at said coordinates.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the annotation data comprises one or more annotation layers to be overlaid over the stored image.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein each annotation layer includes one or more displayed features or regions selected by a user.

5. The method of claim 3 wherein each annotation included in an annotation layer is displayed in a different color.

6. The method of claim 3 wherein each annotation layer can be selectively enabled or disabled.

7. The method of claim 2 wherein the annotation data is stored as a string of a structured language.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the annotation data is stored as a string of data written in a structured language.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the annotation data is stored as an extensible markup language (“XML”) string.

10. The computer implemented method of claim 1

wherein the virtual microscope slide request identifies a particular region of the stored virtual microscope slide image;

wherein obtaining virtual microscope slide image data further comprises obtaining one or more data blocks from the stored virtual microscope slide image, wherein the obtained one or more data blocks correspond to the requested region and include more image data than the requested region; and

further comprising constructing the requested region from the one or more data blocks at the client viewer.

11. The computer implemented method of claim 1 wherein the virtual slide image includes a checksum to validate image integrity of the virtual slide image, the checksum being calculated at a block level.

12. The computer implemented method of claim 1 wherein the plurality of images of the entire virtual slide are organized as a sequence of blocks.

13. The computer implemented method of claim 12 wherein the blocks are compressed individually.

14. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising storing the scaled image at the virtual microscope slide image server in association with the requested virtual microscope slide.

15. The computer implemented method of claim 14 wherein storing the scaled image further comprises storing the scaled image in a viewer cache.

16. The computer implemented method of claim 14 wherein storing the scaled image further comprises storing the scaled image in a server cache.