Picture analysis applied to biomedicine

Abstract

The application of digital image processing techniques to medical problems has been under development at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, since 1966. The initial research concentrated on medical X-ray films and include (1) image restoration, i.e., using digital techniques to retrieve information partially lost in the imaging system which generated the pictures, (2) image enhancement to emphasize features or remove useless data, and (3) image mensuration to provide more quantitative measurements and analyses than are available through visual inspection techniques. From the initial concern with X-ray image processing, this research in image processing as applied to biomedicine has been expanded to include a system for the automated analysis of images from light and electron microscopes. The Automated Light Microscope System (ALMS), around which the chromosome analysis system has been developed, allows direct scanning of specimen images into a computer for subsequent analysis. The applications of digital image processing to biomedicine at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory encompass 15 separate research projects. The areas selected for discussion in this paper give some indication of the types of picture analysis that are being performed. The current trend in biomedical image processing is toward more human interaction in the research setting.