Breast Cancer Histology Images Research Articles

Dual attention model with reinforcement learning for classification of histology whole-slide images

Digital whole slide images (WSIs) are generally captured at microscopic resolution and encompass extensive spatial data (several billions of pixels per image). Directly feeding these images to deep learning models is computationally intractable due to memory constraints, while downsampling the WSIs risks incurring information loss. Alternatively, splitting the WSIs into smaller patches (or tiles) may result in a loss of important contextual information. In this paper, we propose a novel dual attention approach, consisting of two main components, both inspired by the visual examination process of a pathologist: The first soft attention model processes a low magnification view of the WSI to identify relevant regions of interest (ROIs), followed by a custom sampling method to extract diverse and spatially distinct image tiles from the selected ROIs. The second component, the hard attention classification model further extracts a sequence of multi-resolution glimpses from each tile for classification. Since hard attention is non-differentiable, we train this component using reinforcement learning to predict the location of the glimpses. This approach allows the model to focus on essential regions instead of processing the entire tile, thereby aligning with a pathologist’s way of diagnosis. The two components are trained in an end-to-end fashion using a joint loss function to demonstrate the efficacy of the model. The proposed model was evaluated on two WSI-level classification problems: Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) scoring on breast cancer histology images and prediction of Intact/Loss status of two Mismatch Repair (MMR) biomarkers from colorectal cancer histology images. We show that the proposed model achieves performance better than or comparable to the state-of-the-art methods while processing less than 10% of the WSI at the highest magnification and reducing the time required to infer the WSI-level label by more than 75%. The code is available at github.

CUTTING-EDGE CNN APPROACHES FOR BREAST HISTOPATHOLOGICAL CLASSIFICATION: THE IMPACT OF SPATIAL ATTENTION MECHANISMS

This paper investigates advanced techniques for breast Histopathological Classification using two robust convolutional neural network (CNN) architectures: Inception V3 and VGG19. Spatial attention mechanisms are integrated to enhance the models' capability to focus on crucial regions within histology images. These enhancements improve diagnostic accuracy by allowing the models to concentrate on critical features for accurate detection. The research leverages two prominent datasets, BACH for multiclass classification and BreaKHis for binary classification, which provides extensive collections of breast cancer histology images, enabling thorough training and evaluation of the proposed models. InceptionV3 with spatial attention mechanism achieved an accuracy of 99.73% for binary classification and 99.06% for multiclass classification. Integrating spatial attention mechanisms is anticipated to significantly advance the development of automated breast cancer detection systems, offering potential improvements in early diagnosis and treatment planning. This study demonstrates how combining state-of-the-art CNN architectures with attention mechanisms can significantly improve medical image analysis, ultimately contributing to better patient outcomes.

Deep learning and multiscale analysis for epithelial-mesenchyme segmentation and classification in breast cancer histological images

Deep learning and multiscale analysis for epithelial-mesenchyme segmentation and classification in breast cancer histological images

An improved breast cancer classification with hybrid chaotic sand cat and Remora Optimization feature selection algorithm.

Breast cancer is one of the most often diagnosed cancers in women, and identifying breast cancer histological images is an essential challenge in automated pathology analysis. According to research, the global BrC is around 12% of all cancer cases. Furthermore, around 25% of women suffer from BrC. Consequently, the prediction of BrC depends critically on the quick and precise processing of imaging data. The primary reason deep learning models are used in breast cancer detection is that they can produce findings more quickly and accurately than current machine learning-based techniques. Using a BreakHis dataset, we demonstrated in this work the viability of automatically identifying and classifying BrC. The first stage is pre-processing, which employs an Adaptive Switching Modified Decision Based Unsymmetrical Trimmed Median Filter (ASMDBUTMF) to remove high-density noise. After the image has been pre-processed, it is segmented using the Thresholding Level set approach. Next, we propose a hybrid chaotic sand cat optimization technique, together with the Remora Optimization Algorithm (ROA) for feature selection. The suggested strategy facilitates the acquisition of precise functionality attributes, hence simplifying the detection procedure. Additionally, it aids in resolving problems pertaining to global optimization. Following the selection, the best characteristics proceed to the categorization procedure. A DL classifier called the Conditional Variation Autoencoder is used to discriminate between cancerous and benign tumors while categorizing them. Consequently, a classification accuracy of 99.4%, Precision of 99.2%, Recall of 99.1%, F- score of 99%, Specificity of 99.14%, FDR of 0.54, FNR of 0.001, FPR of 0.002, MCC of 0.98 and NPV of 0.99 were obtained using the proposed approach. Furthermore, compared to other research using the current BreakHis dataset, the results of our research are more desirable.

DEEP NETWORK-BASED METHOD AND SOFTWARE FOR SMALL SAMPLE BIOMEDICAL IMAGE GENERATION AND CLASSIFICATION

Context. The authors of the article investigated the problem of generating and classifying breast cancer histological images. The widespread incidence of breast cancer explains the problem’s relevance. The automated diagnosing procedure saves time and eliminates the subjective aspect. The study’s findings can be applied to cancer CAD systems.
 Objective. The purpose of the study is to develop a deep neural network-based method and software tool for generating and classifying histological images in order to increase classification accuracy.
 Method. The method of histological image generation and classification was developed in the research study. This method employs CNN and GAN. To improve the classification accuracy, the initial image sample was expanded using GAN.
 Results. The computer research of the developed method of image generation and classification was conducted on the basis of the dataset located on the Zenodo platform. Light microscopy served as the basis for obtaining the image. The dataset contained three classes of G1, G2, and G3 breast cancer histological images. Based on the developed method, the accuracy of image classification was 96%. This is a higher classification accuracy compared to existing models such as AlexNet, LeNet5, and VGG16. The software module can be integrated into CAD.
 Conclusions. The developed method of generating and classifying images is the basis of the software module. The software module can be integrated into CAD.

Analysis of neural networks trained with evolutionary algorithms for the classification of breast cancer histological images

Analysis of neural networks trained with evolutionary algorithms for the classification of breast cancer histological images

Automatic Screening System to Distinguish Benign/Malignant Breast-Cancer Histology Images Using Optimized Deep and Handcrafted Features

Breast Cancer (BC) has been increasing in incidence among women for a variety of reasons, and prompt detection and management are essential to reducing mortality rates. In the context of clinical-level breast cancer screening, the needle biopsy sample is used to generate Breast Histology Images (BHIs), which will then be used to confirm the results. Using a novel Deep-Learning Plan (DLP), the proposed work identifies BHI accurately and confirms the severity of BC by confirming its severity. As part of the proposed DLP implementation, four phases are involved: (i) the collection and enhancement of images, (ii) the extraction of features, (iii) the reduction of features and their integration, and (iv) binary classification and validation. The purpose of this study is to optimize deep features and machine features using particle swarm algorithms. To evaluate the performance of the proposed scheme, we compare the results obtained using individual deep features, dual deep features, and hybrid features. Using the hybrid image features in the classifier, this study has determined that ResNet18 with k-nearest neighbor provides superior classification accuracy (> 94%).

Fourier ptychographic and deep learning using breast cancer histopathological image classification.

Automated, as well as accurate classification with breast cancer histological images, was crucial for medical applications because of detecting malignant tumors via histopathological images. In this work create a Fourier ptychographic (FP) and deep learning using breast cancer histopathological image classification. Here the FP method used in the process begins with such a random guess that builds a high-resolution complex hologram, subsequently uses iterative retrieval using FP constraints to stitch around each other low-resolution multi-view means of production owned from either the hologram's high-resolution hologram's elemental images captured via integral imaging. Next, the feature extraction process includes entropy, geometrical features, and textural features. The entropy-based normalization is used to optimize the features. Finally, it attains the classification process of the proposed ENDNN classifies the breast cancer images into normal or abnormal. The experimental outcomes demonstrate that our presented technique overtakes the traditional techniques.

A stain color normalization with robust dictionary learning for breast cancer histological images processing

Microscopic analyses of tissue samples are crucial for confirming the diagnosis of breast cancer. The digitization of these samples has led to the development of computational systems that can assist pathologists. However, these systems may face limitations owing to color variations in the images. Normalization studies have been widely conducted to address these issues, but there is still a need for new proposals that take into account the biological properties of dyes and tissues. This study presents a novel method for normalizing hematoxylin and eosin-stained histological images by estimating the color appearance matrices and density maps of the stain. The proposed method offers contributions in terms of pixel selection and weight definition to improve the color estimation of histological images. Besides, to the best of our knowledge, no previous studies have evaluated normalized images considering both handcrafted and learning features. Breast cancer images with significant color variations were used to evaluate this approach and the results demonstrated its effectiveness and efficiency. The average values of FSIM, NIQE, and QSSIM were up to 0.9866, 3.4298, and 0.9655, respectively. Compared with other normalization techniques, the proposed method showed an increase of up to 5.9261, with the largest difference observed in the amount of noise added, as indicated by the NIQE metric. To determine the impact of normalization on feature extraction, the evaluations included an analysis of both color and deep-learned features. These experiments showed that all evaluated methods harmed the separation of breast cancer samples by color features. In contrast, the deep-learned features resulted in less complex classification problems, especially with the proposed normalization. This technique also reached one of the lowest processing times, nearly 6 s with the largest image from the databases.

MobileNet-SVM: A Lightweight Deep Transfer Learning Model to Diagnose BCH Scans for IoMT-Based Imaging Sensors.

Many individuals worldwide pass away as a result of inadequate procedures for prompt illness identification and subsequent treatment. A valuable life can be saved or at least extended with the early identification of serious illnesses, such as various cancers and other life-threatening conditions. The development of the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) has made it possible for healthcare technology to offer the general public efficient medical services and make a significant contribution to patients' recoveries. By using IoMT to diagnose and examine BreakHis v1 400× breast cancer histology (BCH) scans, disorders may be quickly identified and appropriate treatment can be given to a patient. Imaging equipment having the capability of auto-analyzing acquired pictures can be used to achieve this. However, the majority of deep learning (DL)-based image classification approaches are of a large number of parameters and unsuitable for application in IoMT-centered imaging sensors. The goal of this study is to create a lightweight deep transfer learning (DTL) model suited for BCH scan examination and has a good level of accuracy. In this study, a lightweight DTL-based model "MobileNet-SVM", which is the hybridization of MobileNet and Support Vector Machine (SVM), for auto-classifying BreakHis v1 400× BCH images is presented. When tested against a real dataset of BreakHis v1 400× BCH images, the suggested technique achieved a training accuracy of 100% on the training dataset. It also obtained an accuracy of 91% and an F1-score of 91.35 on the test dataset. Considering how complicated BCH scans are, the findings are encouraging. The MobileNet-SVM model is ideal for IoMT imaging equipment in addition to having a high degree of precision. According to the simulation findings, the suggested model requires a small computation speed and time.

An Approach toward Automatic Specifics Diagnosis of Breast Cancer Based on an Immunohistochemical Image

The paper explored the problem of automatic diagnosis based on immunohistochemical image analysis. The issue of automated diagnosis is a preliminary and advisory statement for a diagnostician. The authors studied breast cancer histological and immunohistochemical images using the following biomarkers progesterone, estrogen, oncoprotein, and a cell proliferation biomarker. The authors developed a breast cancer diagnosis method based on immunohistochemical image analysis. The proposed method consists of algorithms for image preprocessing, segmentation, and the determination of informative indicators (relative area and intensity of cells) and an algorithm for determining the molecular genetic breast cancer subtype. An adaptive algorithm for image preprocessing was developed to improve the quality of the images. It includes median filtering and image brightness equalization techniques. In addition, the authors developed a software module part of the HIAMS software package based on the Java programming language and the OpenCV computer vision library. Four molecular genetic breast cancer subtypes could be identified using this solution: subtype Luminal A, subtype Luminal B, subtype HER2/neu amplified, and basalt-like subtype. The developed algorithm for the quantitative characteristics of the immunohistochemical images showed sufficient accuracy in determining the cancer subtype "Luminal A". It was experimentally established that the relative area of the nuclei of cells covered with biomarkers of progesterone, estrogen, and oncoprotein was more than 85%. The given approach allows for automating and accelerating the process of diagnosis. Developed algorithms for calculating the quantitative characteristics of cells on immunohistochemical images can increase the accuracy of diagnosis.

Breast cancer histological images nuclei segmentation and optimized classification with deep learning

Breast cancer incidences have grown worldwide during the previous few years. The histological images obtained from a biopsy of breast tissues are regarded as being the highest accurate approach to determine whether any cells exhibit symptoms of cancer. The visible position of nuclei inside the image is achieved through the use of instance segmentation, nevertheless, this work involves nucleus segmentation and features classification of the predicted nucleus for the achievement of best accuracy. The extracted features map using the feature pyramid network has been modified using segmenting objects by locations (SOLO) convolution with grasshopper optimization for multiclass classification. A breast cancer multiclassification technique based on a suggested deep learning algorithm was examined to achieve the accuracy of 99.2% using a huge database of ICIAR 2018, demonstrating the method’s efficacy in offering an important weapon for breast cancer multi-classification in a medical setting. The segmentation accuracy achieved is 88.46%.

BM-Net: CNN-Based MobileNet-V3 and Bilinear Structure for Breast Cancer Detection in Whole Slide Images.

Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer and is the leading cause of cancer-related death. Diagnosis of breast cancer is based on the evaluation of pathology slides. In the era of digital pathology, these slides can be converted into digital whole slide images (WSIs) for further analysis. However, due to their sheer size, digital WSIs diagnoses are time consuming and challenging. In this study, we present a lightweight architecture that consists of a bilinear structure and MobileNet-V3 network, bilinear MobileNet-V3 (BM-Net), to analyze breast cancer WSIs. We utilized the WSI dataset from the ICIAR2018 Grand Challenge on Breast Cancer Histology Images (BACH) competition, which contains four classes: normal, benign, in situ carcinoma, and invasive carcinoma. We adopted data augmentation techniques to increase diversity and utilized focal loss to remove class imbalance. We achieved high performance, with 0.88 accuracy in patch classification and an average 0.71 score, which surpassed state-of-the-art models. Our BM-Net shows great potential in detecting cancer in WSIs and is a promising clinical tool.

RECENT CNN-BASED TECHNIQUES FOR BREAST CANCER HISTOLOGY IMAGE CLASSIFICATION

Histology images are extensively used by pathologists to assess abnormalities and detect malignancy in breast tissues. On the other hand, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) are by far, the privileged models for image classification and interpretation. Based on these two facts, we surveyed the recent CNN-based methods for breast cancer histology image analysis. The survey focuses on two major issues usually faced by CNN-based methods namely the design of an appropriate CNN architecture and the lack of a sufficient labelled dataset for training the model. Regarding the design of the CNN architecture, methods examining breast histology images adopt three main approaches: Designing manually from scratch the CNN architecture, using pre-trained models and adopting an automatic architecture design. Methods addressing the lack of labelled datasets are grouped into four categories: methods using pre-trained models, methods using data augmentation, methods adopting weakly supervised learning and those adopting feedforward filter learning. Research works from each category and reported performance are presented in this paper. We conclude the paper by indicating some future research directions related to the analysis of histology images.

The Xception model: A potential feature extractor in breast cancer histology images classification

Computer-assisted pathology analysis is an emerging field in health informatics and extremely important for effective treatment. Herein, we demonstrated the ability of the pre-trained Xception model for magnification-dependent breast cancer histopathological image classification in contrast to handcrafted approaches. The Xception model and SVM classifier with the ‘radial basis function’ kernel has achieved the best and consistent performance with the accuracy of 96.25%, 96.25%, 95.74%, and 94.11% for 40X, 100X, 200X and 400X level of magnification, respectively. A comparison with existing state-of-the-art techniques has been conducted based on accuracy, recall, precision, F1 score, area under ROC and precision–recall curve evaluation metrics.

MCUa: Multi-Level Context and Uncertainty Aware Dynamic Deep Ensemble for Breast Cancer Histology Image Classification.

Breast histology image classification is a crucial step in the early diagnosis of breast cancer. In breast pathological diagnosis, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have demonstrated great success using digitized histology slides. However, tissue classification is still challenging due to the high visual variability of the large-sized digitized samples and the lack of contextual information. In this paper, we propose a novel CNN, called Multi-level Context and Uncertainty aware (MCUa) dynamic deep learning ensemble model. MCUa model consists of several multi-level context-aware models to learn the spatial dependency between image patches in a layer-wise fashion. It exploits the high sensitivity to the multi-level contextual information using an uncertainty quantification component to accomplish a novel dynamic ensemble model. MCUa model has achieved a high accuracy of 98.11% on a breast cancer histology image dataset. Experimental results show the superior effectiveness of the proposed solution compared to the state-of-the-art histology classification models.

Automatic segmentation of breast cancer histological images based on dual-path feature extraction network.

The traditional manual breast cancer diagnosis method of pathological images is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and it is easy to be misdiagnosed. Computer-aided diagnosis of WSIs gradually comes into people*s sight. However, the complexity of high-resolution breast cancer pathological images poses a great challenge to automatic diagnosis, and the existing algorithms are often difficult to balance the accuracy and efficiency. In order to solve these problems, this paper proposes an automatic image segmentation method based on dual-path feature extraction network for breast pathological WSIs, which has a good segmentation accuracy. Specifically, inspired by the concept of receptive fields in the human visual system, dilated convolutional networks are introduced to encode rich contextual information. Based on the channel attention mechanism, a feature attention module and a feature fusion module are proposed to effectively filter and combine the features. In addition, this method uses a light-weight backbone network and performs pre-processing on the data, which greatly reduces the computational complexity of the algorithm. Compared with the classic models, it has improved accuracy and efficiency and is highly competitive.

Dilated and soft attention‐guided convolutional neural network for breast cancer histology images classification

Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer in women, and histopathological imaging is considered the gold standard for its diagnosis. However, the great complexity of histopathological images and the considerable workload make this work extremely time-consuming, and the results may be affected by the subjectivity of the pathologist. Therefore, the development of an accurate, automated method for analysis of histopathological images is critical to this field. In this article, we propose a deep learning method guided by the attention mechanism for fast and effective classification of haematoxylin and eosin-stained breast biopsy images. First, this method takes advantage of DenseNet and uses the feature map's information. Second, we introduce dilated convolution to produce a larger receptive field. Finally, spatial attention and channel attention are used to guide the extraction of the most useful visual features. With the use of fivefold cross-validation, the best model obtained an accuracy of 96.47% on the BACH2018 dataset. We also evaluated our method on other datasets, and the experimental results demonstrated that our model has reliable performance. This study indicates that our histopathological image classifier with a soft attention-guided deep learning model for breast cancer shows significantly better results than the latest methods. It has great potential as an effective tool for automatic evaluation of digital histopathological microscopic images for computer-aided diagnosis.

Fuzzy ensemble of deep learning models using choquet fuzzy integral, coalition game and information theory for breast cancer histology classification

Millions of women, worldwide, suffer from breast cancer and a large number of them succumb to death. In recent years, computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) systems are being developed for the detection of Breast Cancer. A number of fusion techniques have been proposed in this domain, but none of them take into consideration the decisions taken by a subset of classifiers during fusion. Our method, which uses Choquet Integral, considers subsets of classifiers and is thus stronger than the existing methods and beat all of these existing fusion methods in terms of accuracy. This however poses a significant challenge in terms of complexity, since the calculation of the fuzzy measures is a complicated and complex task, which we have dealt with using a novel heuristic method by employing Coalition Game, Information Theory, and by defining a novel mathematical function. In the present work, we have fused VGG16, VGG19, Xception, Inception V3, and InceptionResnet V2 for the classification of breast cancer histology images using a Choquet integral, Coalition game theory, and Information theory. The dataset used for evaluating the proposed model is the ICIAR 2018 Grand Challenge on Breast Cancer Histology (popularly known as BACH) images, which consist of 2-class and 4-class problems. To the best of our knowledge, our experimental results outperform almost all the state-of-the-art methods. For the two-class problem, the best test accuracy among the five deep learning models was achieved by Xception and it was 95% while the Fusion method has a test accuracy of 96%. For the four-class problem, Xception and InceptionResnet V2 have achieved the best test accuracy and both have a test accuracy of 91% while the Fusion method has a test accuracy of 95%. Again, in the case of the two-class problem the best precision and recall by the deep learning models are 0.95 and 0.95 respectively, while the precision and recall for after fusion are 0.96 and 0.96 respectively which is an increase of .01. In the case of the four-class problem, the best precision and recall by the deep learning models are 0.91 and 0.91 respectively, while the precision and recall after fusion are 0.95 and 0.95 respectively which is a very significant increase of .04. The source code for this project can be accessed at https://github.com/subhankar01/fuzzyBACH

Nuclei Segmentation on Histopathology Images of Breast Carcinoma.

With the use of computer-aided diagnostic systems, the automatic detection and segmentation of the cell nuclei have become essential in pathology due to cellular nuclei counting and nuclear pleomorphism analysis are critical for the classification and grading of breast cancer histopathology. This work describes a methodology for automatic detection and segmentation of cellular nuclei in breast cancer histopathology images obtained from the BreakHis database, the Standford tissue microarray database, and the Breast Cancer Cell Segmentation database. The proposed scheme is based on the characterization of Hematoxylin and Eosin (H&E) staining, size, and shape features. In addition, we use the information obtained from morphological transformations and adaptive intensity adjustments to detect and separate each cell nucleus detected in the image. The segmentation was carried out by testing the proposed methodology in a histological breast cancer database that provides the associated groundtruth segmentation. Subsequently, the Sørensen-Dice similarity coefficient was calculated to analyze the suitability of the results.Clinical relevance- In this work, the detection and segmentation of cell nuclei in breast cancer histological images are carried out automatically. The method can identify cell nuclei regardless of variations in the level of staining and image magnification. Moreover, a granulometric analysis of the components allows identifying cell clumps and segment them into individual cell nuclei. Improved identification of cell nuclei under different image conditions was demonstrated to reach a sensitivity average of 0.76 ± 0.12. The results provide a base for further and complex processes such as cell counting, feature analysis, and nuclear pleomorphism, which are relevant tasks in the evaluation and diagnostic performed by the expert pathologist.