Image Segmentation Approach Research Articles

The Active Segmentation Platform for Microscopic Image Classification and Segmentation.

Image segmentation still represents an active area of research since no universal solution can be identified. Traditional image segmentation algorithms are problem-specific and limited in scope. On the other hand, machine learning offers an alternative paradigm where predefined features are combined into different classifiers, providing pixel-level classification and segmentation. However, machine learning only can not address the question as to which features are appropriate for a certain classification problem. The article presents an automated image segmentation and classification platform, called Active Segmentation, which is based on ImageJ. The platform integrates expert domain knowledge, providing partial ground truth, with geometrical feature extraction based on multi-scale signal processing combined with machine learning. The approach in image segmentation is exemplified on the ISBI 2012 image segmentation challenge data set. As a second application we demonstrate whole image classification functionality based on the same principles. The approach is exemplified using the HeLa and HEp-2 data sets. Obtained results indicate that feature space enrichment properly balanced with feature selection functionality can achieve performance comparable to deep learning approaches. In summary, differential geometry can substantially improve the outcome of machine learning since it can enrich the underlying feature space with new geometrical invariant objects.

Pollen Detection in Images Using Genetic Algorithms and Tabu Search

Pollen recognition is one of the most active research areas in field of ecological modeling. It is done either via microscopic images analysis of pollen grains, or via chemical components analysis. In this paper, we were interested in pollen images analysis, in which we proposed an approach for image segmentation in order to detect pollen grains in the microscopic images. The approach starts by generating two pixels using genetic algorithms where one pixel of the selected ones is a pollen pixel while the other is background pixels, then we used kmeans algorithm for image pixels clustering to segment the input image, after that we classified the segmented images using machine learning technics, and finally, we used taboo search to save the best pixels chosen by genetic algorithm based on the obtained accuracy as fitness function. The obtained results proved the efficiency of the proposed system where it could recognize 96.4% of the pollen grains.

Deep learning-based histopathological segmentation for whole slide images of colorectal cancer in a compressed domain

Automatic pattern recognition using deep learning techniques has become increasingly important. Unfortunately, due to limited system memory, general preprocessing methods for high-resolution images in the spatial domain can lose important data information such as high-frequency information and the region of interest. To overcome these limitations, we propose an image segmentation approach in the compressed domain based on principal component analysis (PCA) and discrete wavelet transform (DWT). After inference for each tile using neural networks, a whole prediction image was reconstructed by wavelet weighted ensemble (WWE) based on inverse discrete wavelet transform (IDWT). The training and validation were performed using 351 colorectal biopsy specimens, which were pathologically confirmed by two pathologists. For 39 test datasets, the average Dice score, the pixel accuracy, and the Jaccard score were 0.804 ± 0.125, 0.957 ± 0.025, and 0.690 ± 0.174, respectively. We can train the networks for the high-resolution image with the large region of interest compared to the result in the low-resolution and the small region of interest in the spatial domain. The average Dice score, pixel accuracy, and Jaccard score are significantly increased by 2.7%, 0.9%, and 2.7%, respectively. We believe that our approach has great potential for accurate diagnosis.

Rapid and flexible segmentation of electron microscopy data using few-shot machine learning

Automatic segmentation of key microstructural features in atomic-scale electron microscope images is critical to improved understanding of structure–property relationships in many important materials and chemical systems. However, the present paradigm involves time-intensive manual analysis that is inherently biased, error-prone, and unable to accommodate the large volumes of data produced by modern instrumentation. While more automated approaches have been proposed, many are not robust to a high variety of data, and do not generalize well to diverse microstructural features and material systems. Here, we present a flexible, semi-supervised few-shot machine learning approach for segmentation of scanning transmission electron microscopy images of three oxide material systems: (1) epitaxial heterostructures of SrTiO3/Ge, (2) La0.8Sr0.2FeO3 thin films, and (3) MoO3 nanoparticles. We demonstrate that the few-shot learning method is more robust against noise, more reconfigurable, and requires less data than conventional image analysis methods. This approach can enable rapid image classification and microstructural feature mapping needed for emerging high-throughput characterization and autonomous microscope platforms.

High-speed image processing of fluid particle breakage in turbulent flow

Visualization and analysis of size and shape of fluid particles breakage in turbulent flow have been studied using high speed cameras and an image processing technique. The focus of this experimental research was set to investigate and discuss the accuracy and uncertainties of the different measurements obtained through image processing. The discussion presented shows different aspects in which image processing can affect the accuracy of the measurements obtained, with particular emphasis on the effects of the sizes determination of fluid particles. A novel approach for image segmentation is also presented and compared. We found that a higher accuracy can be achieved when this method is used.

NURBS functional network approach for automatic image segmentation of macroscopic medical images in melanoma detection

Image processing techniques are becoming standard technology in many medical specialities, such as dermatology, where they are a key tool for the early detection and diagnosis of melanoma and other skin cancers and tumors. A previous paper by the authors presented at SOCO 2020 conference introduced a new method for image segmentation of skin images through functional networks. The method performs well but it relies on a semi-automatic approach involving a combination of manual and automatic operations. This paper aims at making image segmentation of macroscopic skin images a fully automatic process. To this purpose, the present work extends our previous paper with five new relevant contributions: (1) a filtering strategy for removal of noise, hair and other artifacts; (2) two morphological operators for image enhancement; (3) a clustering-based binary classifier to separate the skin tumor from the image background; (4) a smoothing and discretization process to obtain the border points; and (5) a curve reconstruction method from the border points with NURBS using a new type of functional network particularly tailored for this task. This new method is applied to two different benchmarks, comprised respectively of four and two macroscopic medical images of skin tumors. The visual and numerical results show that the method performs very well, yielding segmented images which are suitable for clinical practice. This method is a significant step towards the future development of a fully automatic approach for the whole medical image analysis pipeline of skin images, including diagnosis and classification.

Deep Learning-Based Segmentation and Uncertainty Assessment for Automated Analysis of Myocardial Perfusion MRI Datasets Using Patch-Level Training and Advanced Data Augmentation.

In this work, we develop a patch-level training approach and a task-driven intensity-based augmentation method for deep-learning-based segmentation of motion-corrected perfusion cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) datasets. Further, the proposed method generates an image-based uncertainty map thanks to a novel spatial sliding-window approach used during patch-level training, hence allowing for uncertainty quantification. Using the quantified uncertainty, we detect the out-of-distribution test data instances so that the end-user can be alerted that the test data is not suitable for the trained network. This feature has the potential to enable a more reliable integration of the proposed deep learning-based framework into clinical practice. We test our approach on external MRI data acquired using a different acquisition protocol to demonstrate the robustness of our performance to variations in pulse-sequence parameters. The presented results further demonstrate that our deep-learning image segmentation approach trained with the proposed data-augmentation technique incorporating spatiotemporal (2D+time) patches is superior to the state-of-the-art 2D approach in terms of generalization performance.

Satellite imagery to select a sample of rooftops for a PV installation project in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

A region-based convolutional neural network image segmentation approach (Mask R-CNN) was applied to identification of flat rooftops from satellite imagery in the city of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. The model was trained on a small sample of rooftops (202) digitized from a 0.5 m resolution image (covering 0.21 km2) and then was applied to an independent area 4.5 km away. The precision and recall of the model were 0.98 and 0.96 respectively in terms of identifying rooftops in the independent area. A spatially stratified sample of rooftops was drawn from those identified by the model and the median roof area of the sample was not significantly different from the area as a whole. The results, although at a small scale, demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach for selecting buildings with appropriate rooftops for solar photovoltaic (PV) installation, in the context of closely spaced flat-roofed buildings, without requiring cadastral mapping or LIDAR datasets.

Distinguishing of different tissue types using K-Means clustering of color segmentation

Millions of lives might be saved if stained tissues could be detected quickly. Image classification algorithms may be used to detect the shape of cancerous cells, which is crucial in determining the severity of the disease. With the rapid advancement of digital technology, digital images now play a critical role in the current day, with rapid applications in the medical and visualization fields. Tissue segmentation in whole-slide photographs is a crucial task in digital pathology, as it is necessary for fast and accurate computer-aided diagnoses. When a tissue picture is stained with eosin and hematoxylin, precise tissue segmentation is especially important for a successful diagnosis. This kind of staining aids pathologists in distinguishing between different tissue types. This work offers a clustering-based color segmentation approach for medical images that can successfully find the core points of clusters through penetrating the red-green-blue (RGB) pairings without previous information. Here, the number of RGB pairs functions as a clusters’ number to increase the accuracy of current algorithms by establishing the automated initialization settings for conventional K-Means clustering algorithms. On a picture of tissue stained with eosin and hematoxylin, the developed K-Means clustering technique is used in this study (H&E). The blue items are found in Cluster 3. There are things in both light and dark blue. The results showed that the proposed technique can differentiate light blue from dark blue employing the 'L*' layer in L*a*b* Color Space (L*a*b* CS). The work recognized the cells' nuclei with a dark blue color successfully. As a result, this approach may aid in precisely diagnosing the stage of tumor invasion and guiding clinical therapies

CGFFCM: Cluster-weight and Group-local Feature-weight learning in Fuzzy C-Means clustering algorithm for color image segmentation

The fuzzy c-means (FCM) algorithm is a popular method for data clustering and image segmentation. However, the main problem of this algorithm is that it is very sensitive to the initialization of primary clusters, so it may not perform well in segmenting complex images. Another problem with the FCM is the equal importance of the image features used during the segmentation process, which causes unstable performance on different images. In this paper, we propose an FCM-based color image segmentation approach, termed CGFFCM, applying an automatic cluster weighting scheme to reduce the sensitivity to the initialization, and a group-local feature weighting strategy to better image segmentation. Also, we combine the proposed clustering algorithm with the Imperialist Competitive Algorithm (ICA) to optimize the feature weighting process. In addition, we apply an efficient combination of image features to increase the segmentation quality. The performance of CGFFCM is evaluated and compared with state-of-the-art methods (such as SMKIFC (semi-supervised surrogate-assisted multi-objective kernel intuitionistic fuzzy clustering), and A-PSO-IT2IFCM (alternate particle swarm optimization based adaptive interval type-2 intuitionistic FCM clustering algorithm)) using the Berkeley benchmark dataset. The results obtained by CGFFCM are 95%, 79%, and 91%, in terms of average Accuracy, NMI, and F-score metrics, respectively, which all are better than the competitors. The implementation source code of CGFFCM is made publicly available at https://github.com/Amin-Golzari-Oskouei/CGFFCM.

EVALUATION OF COMPLEXITY MEASURES FOR DEEP LEARNING GENERALIZATION IN MEDICAL IMAGE ANALYSIS.

The generalization error of deep learning models for medical image analysis often increases on images collected with different devices for data acquisition, device settings, or patient population. A better understanding of the generalization capacity on new images is crucial for clinicians' trustworthiness. Although significant efforts have been recently directed toward establishing generalization bounds and complexity measures, there is still a significant discrepancy between the predicted and actual generalization performance. As well, related large empirical studies have been primarily based on validation with general-purpose image datasets. This paper presents an empirical study that investigates the correlation between 25 complexity measures and the generalization abilities of deep learning classifiers for breast ultrasound images. The results indicate that PAC-Bayes flatness and path norm measures produce the most consistent explanation for the combination of models and data. We also report that multi-task classification and segmentation approach for breast images is conducive toward improved generalization.

Image Segmentation and the Projections of Graphic Centred Approaches in Medical Image Processing

Medical image segmentation is considered the most precarious element in the analysis and processing of real-life images in the clinical sector. Actually, segmentation effects affect the subsequent procedures of image evaluation, life object illustration and description, feature dimensions and the subsequent considerable task levels such as object categorization. In that case, medical image segmentation is the most essential and crucial aspect for aiding the visualization, delineation and depiction of regions of interest for any particular image. The aspect of physical segmentation of a picture is not just challenging and time-consuming task to do, but also problematic to assure accuracy considering the wide-range image modalities and unguided image quantities which have to be observed. In that case, it now becomes fundamental to evaluate the present approaches of image segmentation based on the application of computing algorithms which require the interaction of users with evaluating medical images. In the process of image segmentation, an anatomic classification requires to be extracted or defined to be projected effectively and independently. In that case, this contribution is focused on image segmentation to extract details for decision-making in the clinical sector. The paper presents generalized and relative techniques that have been categorized into three groups: pixel-centre, edge-centred and region-centred techniques. The paper also provides a highlight of the strengths and weaknesses of these techniques in reference to the appropriateness of a wide-range application in medical image segmentation.

Design of Hybrid Deep Learning Approach for Covid-19 Infected Lung Image Segmentation

Lung infection or sickness is one of the most common acute ailments in humans. Pneumonia is one of the most common lung infections, and the annual global mortality rate from untreated pneumonia is increasing. Because of its rapid spread, pneumonia caused by the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) has emerged as a global danger as of December 2019. At the clinical level, the COVID-19 is frequently measured using a Computed Tomography Scan Slice (CTS) or a Chest X-ray. The goal of this study is to develop an image processing method for analyzing COVID-19 infection in CTS patients. The images in this study were preprocessed using the Hybrid Swarm Intelligence and Fuzzy DPSO algorithms. The findings suggest that the proposed method is more dependable, accurate, and simple than existing methods.

A Combined Image Segmentation and Classification Approach for COVID-19 Infected Lungs

Lung infection or sickness is one of the most common acute ailments in humans. Pneumonia is one of the most common lung infections, and the annual global mortality rate from untreated pneumonia is increasing. Because of its rapid spread, pneumonia caused by the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) has emerged as a global danger as of December 2019. At the clinical level, the COVID-19 is frequently measured using a Computed Tomography Scan Slice (CTS) or a Chest X-ray. The goal of this study is to develop an image processing method for analysing COVID-19 infection in CT Scan patients. The images in this study were preprocessed using the Hybrid Swarm Intelligence and Fuzzy DPSO algorithms. According to extensive computer simulations, the persistent learning strategy for CT image segmentation using image enhancement is more efficient and adaptive than the Medical Image Segmentation (MIS) method. The findings suggest that the proposed method is more dependable, accurate, and simple than existing methods.

A Comprehensive Review of Image Segmentation Techniques

Image segmentation is a wide research topic; a huge amount of research has been performed in this context. Image segmentation is a crucial procedure for most object detection, image recognition, feature extraction, and classification tasks depend on the quality of the segmentation process. Image segmentation is the dividing of a specific image into a numeral of homogeneous segments; therefore, the representation of an image into simple and easy forms increases the effectiveness of pattern recognition. The effectiveness of approaches varies according to the conditions of objects arrangement, lighting, shadow, and other factors. However, there is no generic approach for successfully segmenting all images, where some approaches have been proven to be more effective than others. The major goal of this study is to provide summarize of the disadvantages and the advantages of each of the reviewed approaches of image segmentation.

Automatic Superpixel-Based Clustering for Color Image Segmentation Using q-Generalized Pareto Distribution under Linear Normalization and Hunger Games Search

Superixel is one of the most efficient of the image segmentation approaches that are widely used for different applications. In this paper, we developed an image segmentation based on superpixel and an automatic clustering using q-Generalized Pareto distribution under linear normalization (q-GPDL), called ASCQPHGS. The proposed method uses the superpixel algorithm to segment the given image, then the Density Peaks clustering (DPC) is employed to the results obtained from the superpixel algorithm to produce a decision graph. The Hunger games search (HGS) algorithm is employed as a clustering method to segment the image. The proposed method is evaluated using two different datasets, collected form Berkeley segmentation dataset and benchmark (BSDS500) and standford background dataset (SBD). More so, the proposed method is compared to several methods to verify its performance and efficiency. Overall, the proposed method showed significant performance and it outperformed all compared methods using well-known performance metrics.

An Approach for Thoracic Syndrome Classification with Convolutional Neural Networks.

There have been remarkable changes in our lives and the way we perceive the world with advances in computing technology. Healthcare sector is evolving with the intervention of the latest computer-driven technology and has made a remarkable change in the diagnosis and treatment of various diseases. Due to many governing factors including air pollution, there is a rapid rise in chest-related diseases and the number of such patients is rising at an alarming rate. In this research work, we have employed machine learning approach for the detecting various chest-related problems using convolutional neural networks (CNN) on an open dataset of chest X-rays. The method has an edge over the traditional approaches for image segmentation including thresholding, k-means clustering, and edge detection. The CNN cannot scan and process the whole image at an instant; it needs to recursively scan small pixel spots until it has scanned the whole image. Spatial transformation layers and VGG19 have been used for the purpose of feature extraction, and ReLU activation function has been employed due to its inherent low complexity and high computation efficiency; finally, stochastic gradient descent has been used as an optimizer. The main advantage of the current method is that it retains the essential features of the image for prediction along with incorporating a considerable dimensional reduction. The model delivered substantial improvement over existing research in terms of precision, f-score, and accuracy of prediction. This model if used precisely can be very effective for healthcare practitioners in determining the thoracic or pneumonic symptoms in the patient at an early stage thus guiding the practitioner to start the treatment immediately leading to fast improvement in the health status of the patient.

ResBCU-Net: Deep learning approach for segmentation of skin images

Large networks on big datasets have put great impact in success of deep neural networks (DNNs). The greatest breakthrough achieved in this field in 2012 by successful training of a large network, AlexNet, on ImageNet dataset containing 1 million images. U-Net architecture, a DNN based on Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), immensely advanced segmentation of medical images. In the present times, neural networks have outperformed other state-of-the-art approaches in segmentation of images. In this paper, we present a neural network based on the CNNs for segmentation of medical images. The network, ResBCU-Net, is an extension of the U-Net which utilizes Residual blocks, Batch normalization and Bi-directional ConvLSTM. In addition, we present an extended form of ResBCU-Net, ResBCU-Net(d = 3), which takes advantage of densely connected layers in its bottleneck section. The proposed neural network is trained and evaluated on ISIC 2018 dataset, which is publicly available dataset containing 2594 melanoma cancerous skin images. The network inferences segmentation of the images more accurately than other state-of-the-art alternatives.

COMPARATIVE STUDY OF MODERN NEURAL NETWORK ARCHITECTURES FOR MEDICAL IMAGE SEGMENTATION PROBLEMS

Computer Vision is the area of Machine Learning that is responsible for machine perception of visual information. Image segmentation is a subfield of Computer Vision that solves the task of dividing a digital image into segments by their class label. One of the main problems in the subfield is the scarcity of data and the restoration of spatial information for the classified image. This article is a brief survey of current Biomedical Image Segmentation approaches, specifically Convolutional Neural Networks architectures and the morphological transformation for data augmentation.

A Survey on Segmentation Techniques for Image Processing

The segmentation methods for image processing are studied in the presented work. Image segmentation can be defined as a vital step in digital image processing. Also, it is used in various applications including object co-segmentation, recognition tasks, medical imaging, content based image retrieval, object detection, machine vision and video surveillance. A lot of approaches were created for image segmentation. In addition, the main goal of segmentation is to facilitate and alter the image representation into something which is more important and simply to be analyzed. The approaches of image segmentation are splitting the images into a few parts on the basis of image’s features including texture, color, pixel intensity value and so on. With regard to the presented study, many approaches of image segmentation are reviewed and discussed. The techniques of segmentation might be categorized into six classes: First, thresholding segmentation techniques such as global thresholding (iterative thresholding, minimum error thresholding, otsu's, optimal thresholding, histogram concave analysis and entropy based thresholding), local thresholding (Sauvola’s approach, T.R Singh’s approach, Niblack’s approaches, Bernsen’s approach Bruckstein’s and Yanowitz method and Local Adaptive Automatic Binarization) and dynamic thresholding. Second, edge-based segmentation techniques such as gray-histogram technique, gradient based approach (laplacian of gaussian, differential coefficient approach, canny approach, prewitt approach, Roberts approach and sobel approach). Thirdly, region based segmentation approaches including Region growing techniques (seeded region growing (SRG), statistical region growing, unseeded region growing (UsRG)), also merging and region splitting approaches. Fourthly, clustering approaches, including soft clustering (fuzzy C-means clustering (FCM)) and hard clustering (K-means clustering). Fifth, deep neural network techniques such as convolution neural network, recurrent neural networks (RNNs), encoder-decoder and Auto encoder models and support vector machine. Finally, hybrid techniques such as evolutionary approaches, fuzzy logic and swarm intelligent (PSO and ABC techniques) and discusses the pros and cons of each method.