Automatic recognition of different types of acute leukaemia using peripheral blood cell images

[eng] Clinical pathologists have learned to identify morphological qualitative features to characterise the different normal cells, as well as the abnormal cell types whose presence in peripheral blood is the evidence of serious haematological diseases. A drawback of visual morphological analysis is that is time consuming, requires well-trained personnel and is prone to intra-observer variability, which is particularly true when dealing with blast cells. Indeed, subtle interclass morphological differences exist for leukaemia types, which turns into low specificity scores in the routine screening. They are well-known the difficulties that clinical pathologists have in the discrimination among different blasts and the subjectivity associated with their morphological recognition. The general objective of this thesis is the automatic recognition of different types of blast cells circulating in peripheral blood in acute leukaemia using digital image processing and machine learning techniques. In order to accomplish this objective, this thesis starts with a discrimination among normal mononuclear cells, reactive lymphocytes and three types of leukemic cells using traditional machine learning techniques and hand-crafted features obtained from cell segmentation. In the second part of the thesis, a new predictive system designed with two serially connected convolutional neural networks is developed for the diagnosis of acute leukaemia. This system was proved to distinguish neoplastic (leukaemia) and non-neoplastic (infections) diseases, as well as recognise the leukaemia lineage. Furthermore, it was evaluated for its integration in a real-clinical setting. This thesis also contributes in advancing the state of the art of the automatic recognition of acute leukaemia by providing a more realistic approach which reflects the real-life complexity of acute leukaemia diagnosis

Quantitative-Morphological and Cytological Analyses in Leukemia

Leukemia, a blood cancer originating in the bone marrow, presents as a heterogeneous disease with highly variable survival rates. Leukemia is classified into major types based on the rate of cancerous cell growth and cell lineage: chronic or acute and myeloid or lymphoid leukemia. Histological and cytological analysis of the peripheral blood and the bone marrow can classify these major leukemia categories. However, histological analyses of patient biopsies and cytological microscopic assessment of blood and bone marrow smears are insufficient to diagnose leukemia subtypes and to direct therapy. Hence, more expensive and time-consuming diagnostic tools routinely complement histological-cytological analysis during a patient’s diagnosis. To extract more accurate and detailed information from patient tissue samples, digital pathology is emerging as a powerful tool to enhance biopsy- and smear-based decisions. Furthermore, digital pathology methods integrated with advances in machine learning enable new diagnostic features from leukemia patients’ histological and cytological slides and optimize patient classification, thus providing a cheaper, more robust, and faster diagnostic tool than current standards. This review summarizes emerging approaches to automatically diagnose leukemia from morphological and cytological-histological analyses

The detection and classification of blast cell in Leukaemia Acute Promyelocytic Leukaemia (AML M3) blood using simulated annealing and neural networks

This paper was delivered at AIME 2011: 13th Conference on Artifical Intelligence in Medicine.This paper presents a method for the detection and classification of blast cells in M3 with others sub-types using simulated annealing and neural networks. In this paper, we increased our test result from 10 images to 20 images. We performed Hill Climbing, Simulated Annealing and Genetic Algorithms for detecting the blast cells. As a result, simulated annealing is the “best” heuristic search for detecting the leukaemia cells. From the detection, we performed features extraction on the blast cells and we classifying based on M3 and other sub-types using neural networks. We received convincing result which has targeting around 97% in classifying of M3 with other sub-types. Our results are based on real world image data from a Haematology Department.Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia and the Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysi

Automated Detection of Acute Leukemia using K-mean Clustering Algorithm

Leukemia is a hematologic cancer which develops in blood tissue and triggers rapid production of immature and abnormal shaped white blood cells. Based on statistics it is found that the leukemia is one of the leading causes of death in men and women alike. Microscopic examination of blood sample or bone marrow smear is the most effective technique for diagnosis of leukemia. Pathologists analyze microscopic samples to make diagnostic assessments on the basis of characteristic cell features. Recently, computerized methods for cancer detection have been explored towards minimizing human intervention and providing accurate clinical information. This paper presents an algorithm for automated image based acute leukemia detection systems. The method implemented uses basic enhancement, morphology, filtering and segmenting technique to extract region of interest using k-means clustering algorithm. The proposed algorithm achieved an accuracy of 92.8% and is tested with Nearest Neighbor (KNN) and Naive Bayes Classifier on the data-set of 60 samples.Comment: Presented in ICCCCS 201

Acute Myeloid Leukemia

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is the most common type of leukemia. The Cancer Genome Atlas Research Network has demonstrated the increasing genomic complexity of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). In addition, the network has facilitated our understanding of the molecular events leading to this deadly form of malignancy for which the prognosis has not improved over past decades. AML is a highly heterogeneous disease, and cytogenetics and molecular analysis of the various chromosome aberrations including deletions, duplications, aneuploidy, balanced reciprocal translocations and fusion of transcription factor genes and tyrosine kinases has led to better understanding and identification of subgroups of AML with different prognoses. Furthermore, molecular classification based on mRNA expression profiling has facilitated identification of novel subclasses and defined high-, poor-risk AML based on specific molecular signatures. However, despite increased understanding of AML genetics, the outcome for AML patients whose number is likely to rise as the population ages, has not changed significantly. Until it does, further investigation of the genomic complexity of the disease and advances in drug development are needed. In this review, leading AML clinicians and research investigators provide an up-to-date understanding of the molecular biology of the disease addressing advances in diagnosis, classification, prognostication and therapeutic strategies that may have significant promise and impact on overall patient survival

Image processing and machine learning in the morphological analysis of blood cells

Introduction: This review focuses on how image processing and machine learning can be useful for the morphological characterization and automatic recognition of cell images captured from peripheral blood smears. Methods: The basics of the 3 core elements (segmentation, quantitative features, and classification) are outlined, and recent literature is discussed. Although red blood cells are a significant part of this context, this study focuses on malignant lymphoid cells and blast cells. Results: There is no doubt that these technologies may help the cytologist to perform efficient, objective, and fast morphological analysis of blood cells. They may also help in the interpretation of some morphological features and may serve as learning and survey tools. Conclusion: Although research is still needed, it is important to define screening strategies to exploit the potential of image-based automatic recognition systems integrated in the daily routine of laboratories along with other analysis methodologies.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Content aware multi-focus image fusion for high-magnification blood film microscopy

Automated digital high-magnification optical microscopy is key to accelerating biology research and improving pathology clinical pathways. High magnification objectives with large numerical apertures are usually preferred to resolve the fine structural details of biological samples, but they have a very limited depth-of-field. Depending on the thickness of the sample, analysis of specimens typically requires the acquisition of multiple images at different focal planes for each field-of-view, followed by the fusion of these planes into an extended depth-of-field image. This translates into low scanning speeds, increased storage space, and processing time not suitable for high-throughput clinical use. We introduce a novel content-aware multi-focus image fusion approach based on deep learning which extends the depth-of-field of high magnification objectives effectively. We demonstrate the method with three examples, showing that highly accurate, detailed, extended depth of field images can be obtained at a lower axial sampling rate, using 2-fold fewer focal planes than normally required

Use of Image Processing Techniques to Automatically Diagnose Sickle-Cell Anemia Present in Red Blood Cells Smear

Sickle Cell Anemia is a blood disorder which results from the abnormalities of red blood cells and shortens the life expectancy to 42 and 48 years for males and females respectively. It also causes pain, jaundice, shortness of breath, etc. Sickle Cell Anemia is characterized by the presence of abnormal cells like sickle cell, ovalocyte, anisopoikilocyte. Sickle cell disease usually presenting in childhood, occurs more commonly in people from parts of tropical and subtropical regions where malaria is or was very common. A healthy RBC is usually round in shape. But sometimes it changes its shape to form a sickle cell structure; this is called as sickling of RBC. Majority of the sickle cells (whose shape is like crescent moon) found are due to low haemoglobin content. An image processing algorithm to automate the diagnosis of sickle-cells present in thin blood smears is developed. Images are acquired using a charge-coupled device camera connected to a light microscope. Clustering based segmentation techniques are used to identify erythrocytes (red blood cells) and Sickle-cells present on microscopic slides. Image features based on colour, texture and the geometry of the cells are generated, as well as features that make use of a priori knowledge of the classification problem and mimic features used by human technicians. The red blood cell smears were obtained from IG Hospital, Rourkela. The proposed image processing based identification of sickle-cells in anemic patient will be very helpful for automatic, sleek and effective diagnosis of the disease

Optimizing morphology through blood cell image analysis

Introduction Morphological review of the peripheral blood smear is still a crucial diagnostic aid as it provides relevant information related to the diagnosis and is important for selection of additional techniques. Nevertheless, the distinctive cytological characteristics of the blood cells are subjective and influenced by the reviewer's interpretation and, because of that, translating subjective morphological examination into objective parameters is a challenge. Methods The use of digital microscopy systems has been extended in the clinical laboratories. As automatic analyzers have some limitations for abnormal or neoplastic cell detection, it is interesting to identify quantitative features through digital image analysis for morphological characteristics of different cells. Result Three main classes of features are used as follows: geometric, color, and texture. Geometric parameters (nucleus/cytoplasmic ratio, cellular area, nucleus perimeter, cytoplasmic profile, RBC proximity, and others) are familiar to pathologists, as they are related to the visual cell patterns. Different color spaces can be used to investigate the rich amount of information that color may offer to describe abnormal lymphoid or blast cells. Texture is related to spatial patterns of color or intensities, which can be visually detected and quantitatively represented using statistical tools. Conclusion This study reviews current and new quantitative features, which can contribute to optimize morphology through blood cell digital image processing techniques.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version