Paper Info
Title
A hybrid multi-scale model for thyroid nodule boundary detection on ultrasound images.
Abstract
A hybrid model for thyroid nodule boundary detection on ultrasound images is introduced. The segmentation model combines the advantages of the "á trous" wavelet transform to detect sharp gray-level variations and the efficiency of the Hough transform to discriminate the region of interest within an environment with excessive structural noise. The proposed method comprise three major steps: a wavelet edge detection procedure for speckle reduction and edge map estimation, based on local maxima representation. Subsequently, a multiscale structure model is utilised in order to acquire a contour representation by means of local maxima chaining with similar attributes to form significant structures. Finally, the Hough transform is employed with 'a priori' knowledge related to the nodule's shape in order to distinguish the nodule's contour from adjacent structures. The comparative study between our automatic method and manual delineations demonstrated that the boundaries extracted by the hybrid model are closely correlated with that of the physicians. The proposed hybrid method can be of value to thyroid nodules' shape-based classification and as an educational tool for inexperienced radiologists.
Year
DOI
Venue
2006
10.1016/j.cmpb.2006.09.006
Computer Methods and Programs in Biomedicine
Keywords
DocType
Volume
proposed hybrid method,edge map estimation,contour representation,local maxima representation,segmentation model,automatic method,thyroid nodule boundary detection,multiscale structure model,hybrid multi-scale model,ultrasound image,hybrid model,local maxima,region of interest,a priori knowledge,hough transform,comparative study,wavelet transform,edge detection
Journal
84
Issue
ISSN
Citations 
2-3
0169-2607
11
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.77
15
4
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Stavros Tsantis1211.95
N. Dimitropoulos2443.93
Dionisis Cavouras3214.67
George Nikiforidis4162.77