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A three-stage shearlet-based algorithm for vessel segmentation in medical imaging

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Abstract

Dictionaries are known tools used in different branches of image processing like edge detection, inpainting and, etc. Segmentation is the task of extracting an object as the part of a particular image. The common drawback of different segmentation methods is that they perform the extraction task incompletely. Tasks like edge detection, denoising and smoothing, as the parts of segmentation, can be done through applying the dictionaries. In this paper, we propose three new contrast stretching function. Based on one of the stretching functions and shearlets as a dictionary, we improved the previous version of a method that has been used in binary segmentation for magnetic resonance angiography images (MRI). We also introduce a three-stage binary image segmentation algorithm for vessel segmentation in MRI images. There are some disadvantages in recent proposed methods when dealing with extracting vessels of medical images. Our algorithm does the task with a more accurate extraction in detecting vessels having low intensity and weak edges in MRI.

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Notes

  1. Tight-frame-based algorithm.

  2. TFA with Eigenvector.

  3. Shearlet-based algorithm.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Professor M. Poureisa (Tabriz University of Medical Sciences) and Azar Mehr MRI Center for providing us some sample images. The Nasser Aghazadeh would like to thanks Professor Gitta Kutyniok for her support during Nasser Aghazadeh's visit in institut für mathematik, Technische Universität Berlin.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Image Processing Laboratory, Department of Applied Mathematics, Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University, Tabriz, Iran

    Mahdi Mirzafam & Nasser Aghazadeh

  2. Institut für Mathematik, Technische Universität Berlin, Straße des 17 Juni 136, 10623, Berlin, Germany

    Nasser Aghazadeh

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  1. Mahdi Mirzafam
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  2. Nasser Aghazadeh
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Correspondence to Nasser Aghazadeh.

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Mirzafam, M., Aghazadeh, N. A three-stage shearlet-based algorithm for vessel segmentation in medical imaging. Pattern Anal Applic 24, 591–610 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10044-020-00915-3

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