Malignant melanoma diagnosis applying a machine learning method based on the combination of nonlinear and texture features

Abstract

Skin cancer affects people of all skin tones, including those with darker complexions. Melanomas are known as malignant tumors of skin cancer, resulting in an adverse prognosis, responsible for most deaths relating to skin cancer. Early diagnosis and treatment of skin cancer from dermoscopic images can significantly reduce mortality and save lives. In this paper, Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CAD) system based on machine learning algorithms is provided to classify various skin cancer types. The proposed method uses the Online Region-based Active Contour Model (ORACM) with a new binary level set equation and regularization operation to extract skin lesions' Region of Interest (ROI). Additionally, various combinations of different textures and nonlinear features are extracted for the ROI to show the multiple aspects of skin lesions. Several metaheuristic optimization algorithms are used to remove redundant or irrelevant features and reduce the feature space dimension. These are applied to the combination of the extracted features in which, the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGA II) as a multi-objective optimization algorithm has the best performance. Furthermore, various machine learning algorithms including K-Nearest Neighbor (KNN), Support Vector Machine (SVM), Fitting neural network (Fit net), Feed-Forward neural network (FF net), and Pattern recognition network (Pat net) are employed for the classification. In this paper, the best-obtained evaluation parameters based on fivefold cross-validation belong to the combination of selected nonlinear indices, texture, and GLCM features with an accuracy: 92.24 %, specificity: 100 %, and sensitivity: 100 %, resulting through NSGA II and applying the pattern net classifier. Besides, the comparison between this paper's experimental results and other similar works demonstrates the proposed method's efficiency.