Three Dimensional Reconstruction of Coronary Arteries by Using Registration and Texture-Mapping onto Epicardial Surface on Nuclear 3D Image

Abstract

This paper deals with a new method of three dimensional reconstruction of coronary arteries, by using the texture-mapping technique on a myocardial nuclear image. The bi-plane CAG images are texture-mapped onto a LV surface model which is pre-determined on a nuclear 3D image. By maximizing a matching degree between two mapped CAG images, registration between CAG and nuclear image is performed automatically. By taking only true images from the mapped CAG images, we can obtain 3D reconstructed coronary image on the LV surface model. This method has the great advantage that it is not necessary to extract the feature points, nor is there a need to identify the correspondence. The obtained images give us a clear understanding of the relation between the coronary artery and the function of the myocardium.