Authors:
Ali K. Hamou
and
Mahmoud R. El-Sakka
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario, Canada
Keyword(s):
Active contours, Deformable models, Snakes, Gradient vector flow, Shape priors, Optical flow, Echocardiography.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Applications
;
Computer Vision, Visualization and Computer Graphics
;
Image and Video Coding and Compression
;
Image Formation and Preprocessing
;
Medical Imaging
;
Pattern Recognition
;
Software Engineering
Abstract:
Accurate delineation of object borders is highly desirable in echocardiography. Among other model-based techniques, active contours (or snakes) provide a unique and powerful approach to image analysis. In this work, we propose the use of a new external energy for a GVF snake, consisting of the optical flow data of moving heart structures (i.e. the perceived movement). This new external energy provides more information to the active contour model to combat noise in moving sequences. An automated primitive shape prior mechanism is also introduced, which further improves the results when dealing with especially noisy echocardiographic image cines. Results were compared with that of expert manual segmentations yielding promising sensitivities and system accuracies.