64 research outputs found
Multi-site, Multi-domain Airway Tree Modeling (ATM'22): A Public Benchmark for Pulmonary Airway Segmentation
Open international challenges are becoming the de facto standard for
assessing computer vision and image analysis algorithms. In recent years, new
methods have extended the reach of pulmonary airway segmentation that is closer
to the limit of image resolution. Since EXACT'09 pulmonary airway segmentation,
limited effort has been directed to quantitative comparison of newly emerged
algorithms driven by the maturity of deep learning based approaches and
clinical drive for resolving finer details of distal airways for early
intervention of pulmonary diseases. Thus far, public annotated datasets are
extremely limited, hindering the development of data-driven methods and
detailed performance evaluation of new algorithms. To provide a benchmark for
the medical imaging community, we organized the Multi-site, Multi-domain Airway
Tree Modeling (ATM'22), which was held as an official challenge event during
the MICCAI 2022 conference. ATM'22 provides large-scale CT scans with detailed
pulmonary airway annotation, including 500 CT scans (300 for training, 50 for
validation, and 150 for testing). The dataset was collected from different
sites and it further included a portion of noisy COVID-19 CTs with ground-glass
opacity and consolidation. Twenty-three teams participated in the entire phase
of the challenge and the algorithms for the top ten teams are reviewed in this
paper. Quantitative and qualitative results revealed that deep learning models
embedded with the topological continuity enhancement achieved superior
performance in general. ATM'22 challenge holds as an open-call design, the
training data and the gold standard evaluation are available upon successful
registration via its homepage.Comment: 32 pages, 16 figures. Homepage: https://atm22.grand-challenge.org/.
Submitte
Label Refinement Network from Synthetic Error Augmentation for Medical Image Segmentation
Deep convolutional neural networks for image segmentation do not learn the
label structure explicitly and may produce segmentations with an incorrect
structure, e.g., with disconnected cylindrical structures in the segmentation
of tree-like structures such as airways or blood vessels. In this paper, we
propose a novel label refinement method to correct such errors from an initial
segmentation, implicitly incorporating information about label structure. This
method features two novel parts: 1) a model that generates synthetic structural
errors, and 2) a label appearance simulation network that produces synthetic
segmentations (with errors) that are similar in appearance to the real initial
segmentations. Using these synthetic segmentations and the original images, the
label refinement network is trained to correct errors and improve the initial
segmentations. The proposed method is validated on two segmentation tasks:
airway segmentation from chest computed tomography (CT) scans and brain vessel
segmentation from 3D CT angiography (CTA) images of the brain. In both
applications, our method significantly outperformed a standard 3D U-Net and
other previous refinement approaches. Improvements are even larger when
additional unlabeled data is used for model training. In an ablation study, we
demonstrate the value of the different components of the proposed method
AeroPath: An airway segmentation benchmark dataset with challenging pathology
To improve the prognosis of patients suffering from pulmonary diseases, such
as lung cancer, early diagnosis and treatment are crucial. The analysis of CT
images is invaluable for diagnosis, whereas high quality segmentation of the
airway tree are required for intervention planning and live guidance during
bronchoscopy. Recently, the Multi-domain Airway Tree Modeling (ATM'22)
challenge released a large dataset, both enabling training of deep-learning
based models and bringing substantial improvement of the state-of-the-art for
the airway segmentation task. However, the ATM'22 dataset includes few patients
with severe pathologies affecting the airway tree anatomy. In this study, we
introduce a new public benchmark dataset (AeroPath), consisting of 27 CT images
from patients with pathologies ranging from emphysema to large tumors, with
corresponding trachea and bronchi annotations. Second, we present a multiscale
fusion design for automatic airway segmentation. Models were trained on the
ATM'22 dataset, tested on the AeroPath dataset, and further evaluated against
competitive open-source methods. The same performance metrics as used in the
ATM'22 challenge were used to benchmark the different considered approaches.
Lastly, an open web application is developed, to easily test the proposed model
on new data. The results demonstrated that our proposed architecture predicted
topologically correct segmentations for all the patients included in the
AeroPath dataset. The proposed method is robust and able to handle various
anomalies, down to at least the fifth airway generation. In addition, the
AeroPath dataset, featuring patients with challenging pathologies, will
contribute to development of new state-of-the-art methods. The AeroPath dataset
and the web application are made openly available.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Scientific Report
Computer-Aided Assessment of Tuberculosis with Radiological Imaging: From rule-based methods to Deep Learning
Mención Internacional en el tÃtulo de doctorTuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb.)
that produces pulmonary damage due to its airborne nature. This fact facilitates the disease
fast-spreading, which, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), in 2021 caused
1.2 million deaths and 9.9 million new cases.
Traditionally, TB has been considered a binary disease (latent/active) due to the limited
specificity of the traditional diagnostic tests. Such a simple model causes difficulties in the
longitudinal assessment of pulmonary affectation needed for the development of novel drugs
and to control the spread of the disease.
Fortunately, X-Ray Computed Tomography (CT) images enable capturing specific manifestations
of TB that are undetectable using regular diagnostic tests, which suffer from
limited specificity. In conventional workflows, expert radiologists inspect the CT images.
However, this procedure is unfeasible to process the thousands of volume images belonging
to the different TB animal models and humans required for a suitable (pre-)clinical trial.
To achieve suitable results, automatization of different image analysis processes is a
must to quantify TB. It is also advisable to measure the uncertainty associated with this
process and model causal relationships between the specific mechanisms that characterize
each animal model and its level of damage. Thus, in this thesis, we introduce a set of novel
methods based on the state of the art Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Computer Vision (CV).
Initially, we present an algorithm to assess Pathological Lung Segmentation (PLS) employing
an unsupervised rule-based model which was traditionally considered a needed
step before biomarker extraction. This procedure allows robust segmentation in a Mtb. infection
model (Dice Similarity Coefficient, DSC, 94%±4%, Hausdorff Distance, HD,
8.64mm±7.36mm) of damaged lungs with lesions attached to the parenchyma and affected
by respiratory movement artefacts.
Next, a Gaussian Mixture Model ruled by an Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm
is employed to automatically quantify the burden of Mtb.using biomarkers extracted from the
segmented CT images. This approach achieves a strong correlation (R2 ≈ 0.8) between our
automatic method and manual extraction. Consequently, Chapter 3 introduces a model to automate the identification of TB lesions
and the characterization of disease progression. To this aim, the method employs the
Statistical Region Merging algorithm to detect lesions subsequently characterized by texture
features that feed a Random Forest (RF) estimator. The proposed procedure enables a
selection of a simple but powerful model able to classify abnormal tissue.
The latest works base their methodology on Deep Learning (DL). Chapter 4 extends
the classification of TB lesions. Namely, we introduce a computational model to infer
TB manifestations present in each lung lobe of CT scans by employing the associated
radiologist reports as ground truth. We do so instead of using the classical manually delimited
segmentation masks. The model adjusts the three-dimensional architecture, V-Net, to a multitask
classification context in which loss function is weighted by homoscedastic uncertainty.
Besides, the method employs Self-Normalizing Neural Networks (SNNs) for regularization.
Our results are promising with a Root Mean Square Error of 1.14 in the number of nodules
and F1-scores above 0.85 for the most prevalent TB lesions (i.e., conglomerations, cavitations,
consolidations, trees in bud) when considering the whole lung.
In Chapter 5, we present a DL model capable of extracting disentangled information from
images of different animal models, as well as information of the mechanisms that generate
the CT volumes. The method provides the segmentation mask of axial slices from three
animal models of different species employing a single trained architecture. It also infers the
level of TB damage and generates counterfactual images. So, with this methodology, we
offer an alternative to promote generalization and explainable AI models.
To sum up, the thesis presents a collection of valuable tools to automate the quantification
of pathological lungs and moreover extend the methodology to provide more explainable
results which are vital for drug development purposes. Chapter 6 elaborates on these
conclusions.Programa de Doctorado en Multimedia y Comunicaciones por la Universidad Carlos III de Madrid y la Universidad Rey Juan CarlosPresidenta: MarÃa Jesús Ledesma Carbayo.- Secretario: David Expósito Singh.- Vocal: Clarisa Sánchez Gutiérre
Segmentation and Deformable Modelling Techniques for a Virtual Reality Surgical Simulator in Hepatic Oncology
Liver surgical resection is one of the most frequently used curative therapies. However,
resectability is problematic. There is a need for a computer-assisted surgical planning and
simulation system which can accurately and efficiently simulate the liver, vessels and
tumours in actual patients. The present project describes the development of these core
segmentation and deformable modelling techniques.
For precise detection of irregularly shaped areas with indistinct boundaries, the
segmentation incorporated active contours - gradient vector flow (GVF) snakes and level sets.
To improve efficiency, a chessboard distance transform was used to replace part of the GVF
effort. To automatically initialize the liver volume detection process, a rotating template was
introduced to locate the starting slice. For shape maintenance during the segmentation
process, a simplified object shape learning step was introduced to avoid occasional
significant errors. Skeletonization with fuzzy connectedness was used for vessel
segmentation.
To achieve real-time interactivity, the deformation regime of this system was based
on a single-organ mass-spring system (MSS), which introduced an on-the-fly local mesh
refinement to raise the deformation accuracy and the mesh control quality. This method was
now extended to a multiple soft-tissue constraint system, by supplementing it with an
adaptive constraint mesh generation. A mesh quality measure was tailored based on a wide
comparison of classic measures. Adjustable feature and parameter settings were thus
provided, to make tissues of interest distinct from adjacent structures, keeping the mesh
suitable for on-line topological transformation and deformation.
More than 20 actual patient CT and 2 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) liver
datasets were tested to evaluate the performance of the segmentation method. Instrument
manipulations of probing, grasping, and simple cutting were successfully simulated on
deformable constraint liver tissue models. This project was implemented in conjunction with
the Division of Surgery, Hammersmith Hospital, London; the preliminary reality effect was
judged satisfactory by the consultant hepatic surgeon
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