How to treat select elements from within multiple cells as a single vector

What is the proper syntax for this indexing?:

ContainerArray = cell(13,9);
[ContainerAray{:,:}] = deal(rand(1,6))
DesiredVector = sum(ContainerArray{2:end,1}(1,1))

That is, how to I extract the nth elements of the arrays contained in the first cell column, cell rows 2:end (or really any cell index), and treat those extracted nth elements as a single array/vector?

[David Hill]

Why use a cell array if all entries are doubles?

[Gabriel Stanley]

Actual data isn't, was trying to quicky create some dummy data to help illustrate basic problem. Also, even if all array are of the same type, individual arrays could be different sizes as long as a known index (e.g. (1,1)) was guaranteed to exist.

Answer 1

[Jan]

C    = cell(5, 4);
C(:) = {2:5};  % Faster than with DEAL
V    = cellfun(@(x) x(1,1), C(2:end,1), 'UniformOutput', 1)

V = 4×1

2 2 2 2

V    = sum(V)

V = 8

[Gabriel Stanley]

Thank you, Jan. I'll try to improve my utilization and understanding of implicit functions going forward.

[Stephen23]

Perhaps you meant anonymous functions:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/matlab_prog/anonymous-functions.html

[Gabriel Stanley]

yeah, that. Sorry, running on very little sleep atm.