926 research outputs found
Improving Fiber Alignment in HARDI by Combining Contextual PDE Flow with Constrained Spherical Deconvolution
We propose two strategies to improve the quality of tractography results
computed from diffusion weighted magnetic resonance imaging (DW-MRI) data. Both
methods are based on the same PDE framework, defined in the coupled space of
positions and orientations, associated with a stochastic process describing the
enhancement of elongated structures while preserving crossing structures. In
the first method we use the enhancement PDE for contextual regularization of a
fiber orientation distribution (FOD) that is obtained on individual voxels from
high angular resolution diffusion imaging (HARDI) data via constrained
spherical deconvolution (CSD). Thereby we improve the FOD as input for
subsequent tractography. Secondly, we introduce the fiber to bundle coherence
(FBC), a measure for quantification of fiber alignment. The FBC is computed
from a tractography result using the same PDE framework and provides a
criterion for removing the spurious fibers. We validate the proposed
combination of CSD and enhancement on phantom data and on human data, acquired
with different scanning protocols. On the phantom data we find that PDE
enhancements improve both local metrics and global metrics of tractography
results, compared to CSD without enhancements. On the human data we show that
the enhancements allow for a better reconstruction of crossing fiber bundles
and they reduce the variability of the tractography output with respect to the
acquisition parameters. Finally, we show that both the enhancement of the FODs
and the use of the FBC measure on the tractography improve the stability with
respect to different stochastic realizations of probabilistic tractography.
This is shown in a clinical application: the reconstruction of the optic
radiation for epilepsy surgery planning
Diffusion, convection and erosion on R3 x S2 and their application to the enhancement of crossing fibers
In this article we study both left-invariant (convection-)diffusions and left-invariant Hamilton-Jacobi equations (erosions) on the space R3 x S2 of 3D-positions and orientations naturally embedded in the group SE(3) of 3D-rigid body movements. The general motivation for these (convection-)diffusions and erosions is to obtain crossing-preserving fiber enhancement on probability densities defined on the space of positions and orientations. The linear left-invariant (convection-)diffusions are forward Kolmogorov equations of Brownian motions on R3 x S2 and can be solved by R3 x S2-convolution with the corresponding Green’s functions or by a finite difference scheme. The left-invariant Hamilton-Jacobi equations are Bellman equations of cost processes on R3 x S2 and they are solved by a morphological R3 x S2-convolution with the corresponding Green’s functions. We will reveal the remarkable analogy between these erosions/dilations and diffusions. Furthermore, we consider pseudo-linear scale spaces on the space of positions and orientations that combines dilation and diffusion in a single evolution. In our design and analysis for appropriate linear, non-linear, morphological and pseudo-linear scale spaces on R3 x S2 we employ the underlying differential geometry on SE(3), where the frame of left-invariant vector fields serves as a moving frame of reference. Furthermore, we will present new and simpler finite difference schemes for our diffusions, which are clear improvements of our previous finite difference schemes. We apply our theory to the enhancement of fibres in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques (HARDI and DTI) for imaging water diffusion processes in fibrous tissues such as brain white matter and muscles. We provide experiments of our crossing-preserving (non-linear) left-invariant evolutions on neural images of a human brain containing crossing fibers
Total Variation and Mean Curvature PDEs on
Total variation regularization and total variation flows (TVF) have been
widely applied for image enhancement and denoising. To include a generic
preservation of crossing curvilinear structures in TVF we lift images to the
homogeneous space of positions and
orientations as a Lie group quotient in SE(d). For d = 2 this is called 'total
roto-translation variation' by Chambolle & Pock. We extend this to d = 3, by a
PDE-approach with a limiting procedure for which we prove convergence. We also
include a Mean Curvature Flow (MCF) in our PDE model on M. This was first
proposed for d = 2 by Citti et al. and we extend this to d = 3. Furthermore,
for d = 2 we take advantage of locally optimal differential frames in
invertible orientation scores (OS). We apply our TVF and MCF in the
denoising/enhancement of crossing fiber bundles in DW-MRI. In comparison to
data-driven diffusions, we see a better preservation of bundle boundaries and
angular sharpness in fiber orientation densities at crossings. We support this
by error comparisons on a noisy DW-MRI phantom. We also apply our TVF and MCF
in enhancement of crossing elongated structures in 2D images via OS, and
compare the results to nonlinear diffusions (CED-OS) via OS.Comment: Submission to the Seventh International Conference on Scale Space and
Variational Methods in Computer Vision (SSVM 2019). (v2) Typo correction in
lemma 1. (v3) Typo correction last paragraph page
New Exact and Numerical Solutions of the (Convection-)Diffusion Kernels on SE(3)
We consider hypo-elliptic diffusion and convection-diffusion on , the quotient of the Lie group of rigid body motions SE(3) in
which group elements are equivalent if they are equal up to a rotation around
the reference axis. We show that we can derive expressions for the convolution
kernels in terms of eigenfunctions of the PDE, by extending the approach for
the SE(2) case. This goes via application of the Fourier transform of the PDE
in the spatial variables, yielding a second order differential operator. We
show that the eigenfunctions of this operator can be expressed as (generalized)
spheroidal wave functions. The same exact formulas are derived via the Fourier
transform on SE(3). We solve both the evolution itself, as well as the
time-integrated process that corresponds to the resolvent operator.
Furthermore, we have extended a standard numerical procedure from SE(2) to
SE(3) for the computation of the solution kernels that is directly related to
the exact solutions. Finally, we provide a novel analytic approximation of the
kernels that we briefly compare to the exact kernels.Comment: Revised and restructure
Locally Adaptive Frames in the Roto-Translation Group and their Applications in Medical Imaging
Locally adaptive differential frames (gauge frames) are a well-known
effective tool in image analysis, used in differential invariants and
PDE-flows. However, at complex structures such as crossings or junctions, these
frames are not well-defined. Therefore, we generalize the notion of gauge
frames on images to gauge frames on data representations defined on the extended space of positions and
orientations, which we relate to data on the roto-translation group ,
. This allows to define multiple frames per position, one per
orientation. We compute these frames via exponential curve fits in the extended
data representations in . These curve fits minimize first or second
order variational problems which are solved by spectral decomposition of,
respectively, a structure tensor or Hessian of data on . We include
these gauge frames in differential invariants and crossing preserving PDE-flows
acting on extended data representation and we show their advantage compared
to the standard left-invariant frame on . Applications include
crossing-preserving filtering and improved segmentations of the vascular tree
in retinal images, and new 3D extensions of coherence-enhancing diffusion via
invertible orientation scores
The Influence of Spatial Registration on Detection of Cerebral Asymmetries Using Voxel-Based Statistics of Fractional Anisotropy Images and TBSS
The sensitivity of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) for detecting microstructural white matter alterations has motivated the application of voxel-based statistics (VBS) to fractional anisotropy (FA) images (FA-VBS). However, detected group differences may depend on the spatial registration method used. The objective of this study was to investigate the influence of spatial registration on detecting cerebral asymmetries in FA-VBS analyses with reference to data obtained using Tract-Based Spatial Statistics (TBSS). In the first part of this study we performed FA-VBS analyses using three single-contrast and one multi-contrast registration: (i) whole-brain registration based on T2 contrast, (ii) whole-brain registration based on FA contrast, (iii) individual-hemisphere registration based on FA contrast, and (iv) a combination of (i) and (iii). We then compared the FA-VBS results with those obtained from TBSS. We found that the FA-VBS results depended strongly on the employed registration approach, with the best correspondence between FA-VBS and TBSS results when approach (iv), the “multi-contrast individual-hemisphere” method was employed. In the second part of the study, we investigated the spatial distribution of residual misregistration for each registration approach and the effect on FA-VBS results. For the FA-VBS analyses using the three single-contrast registration methods, we identified FA asymmetries that were (a) located in regions prone to misregistrations, (b) not detected by TBSS, and (c) specific to the applied registration approach. These asymmetries were considered candidates for apparent FA asymmetries due to systematic misregistrations associated with the FA-VBS approach. Finally, we demonstrated that the “multi-contrast individual-hemisphere” approach showed the least residual spatial misregistrations and thus might be most appropriate for cerebral FA-VBS analyses
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