SLICACO: An automated novel hybrid approach for dermatoscopic melanocytic skin lesion segmentation

Abstract

AbstractLow contrast images and blurriness pose challenge in the over‐segmentation of image, which increases model complexities. In this work, a novel hybrid dermoscopic skin‐lesion segmentation method, namely SLICACO, is proposed incorporating the simple linear iterative clustering (SLIC) and ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithms. The working of proposed method is multifold. First, over‐segmentation of preprocessed image is generated using SLIC super‐pixel technique. Second, clusters of super‐pixels generated by SLIC are used by ACO with the pixels of similar intensity for edge detection and seek for the optimum pathway in a strained zone. Third, lesion area is segmented using the Convex Hull and Thresholding. Fourth, Erosion Filtering is used to obtain the final segmented image. The performance of SLICACO is assessed on five benchmark dermatoscopic datasets and compared with deep learning models to test its generalizing behavior. Promising results are obtained on the PH2 archive data set with an accuracy of 95.9%.