Foundation Models and Information Retrieval in Digital Pathology

The surge in adoption of digital pathology has the potential to revolutionize medical diagnosis by allowing computerized analysis of tissue images (Pantanowitz 2010; Aljanabi 2012; Hanna2020). Central to this technology is the digitization of formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissue sections mounted on glass slides. This process converts physical tissue samples into high-resolution, gigapixel digital images called whole slide images (WSIs) (Kumar2020; Evans2022). These WSI files contain detailed patterns of tissue morphology, enabling the application of computer-vision algorithms in diagnostic pathology. Pathologists can now analyze tissue images seamlessly on computer screens at various magnifications (Griffin2017). This shift from light microscopes to digital displays allows for easier visual inspection of anatomic clues that may indicate specific diseases.