A geodesic-active-contour-based variational model for short-axis cardiac MR image segmentation

Abstract

We propose a novel geodesic-active-contour-based (GAC-based) variational model that uses two level-set functions to segment the right and left ventricles and the epicardium in short-axis magnetic resonance (MR) images. For the right ventricle, the myocardial wall is typically very thin and hard to identify using the resolution of existing MR scanners. We propose to use two level sets to identify both the endocardial wall by pushing away one level-set function from another, in the setting of the edge-driven GAC model with a new edge detection function. Existing edge detection functions have strict restrictions on the location of initial contours. We develop a new edge detection function that relaxes this restriction and propose an iterative method that uses a sequence of edge detection functions to minimize the energy of our model successively. Experimental results are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed model.

Keywords:

• cardiac segmentation
• geodesic active contour
• level-set method

2010 AMS Subject Classifications:

• 68U10
• 94A08

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the anonymous referees for their valuable suggestion and constructive comments that greatly help improve the presentation of this paper. This work has been supported by the University of Alabama RGC Award and NSF contract DMS-1016504.