结合统计和梯度信息的高效活动轮廓模型

提出一种由统计和梯度信息驱动的活动轮廓模型。该模型有效利用梯度信息使演化轮廓线快速精确地定位到物体的边缘;同时,由局部统计信息和全局统计信息构造符号压力函数,减少噪声对轮廓线演化的影响。另外,模型利用局部统计信息能够有效处理灰度分布不均的图像,全局信息的利用避免了演化轮廓线陷入局部最小,因此,该模型可以任意设置初始轮廓线。最后通过高斯卷积核对水平集函数规则化,避免了传统模型中计算代价高昂的重新初始化和规则化。实验结果表明,提出的模型不仅能够在任意初始轮廓下精确有效地分割灰度分布均匀的图像和不均匀的图像,而且对噪声具有较好的鲁棒性。     

Active contour model combining region and edge information

A novel active contour model is proposed by combining region and edge information. Its level set formulation consists of the edge-related term, the region-based term and the regularization term. The edge-related term is derived from the image gradient, and facilitates the contours evolving into object boundaries. The region-based term is constructed using both local and global statistical information, and related to the direction and velocity of the contour propagation. The last term ensures stable evolution of the contours. Finally, a Gaussian convolution is used to regularize the level set function. In addition, a new quantitative metric named modified root mean squared error is defined, which can be used to evaluate the final contour more accurately. Experimental results show that the proposed method is efficient and robust, and can segment homogenous images and inhomogenous images with the initial contour being set freely.     

基于改进符号压力函数的变分水平集图像分割算法

为了更好地解决含有弱边界、灰度不均匀的图像在分割时出现的轮廓线错误移动而导致分割结果错误的问题,结合图像的统计信息,构造出一种新的符号压力(SPF)函数,提出了一种基于改进的压力符号函数的变分水平集图像分割算法。首先,利用新的压力符号函数代替边缘函数,构造了新的活动轮廓模型;其次,该算法保持了测地线活动轮廓(GAC)模型和chan-vese(C-V) 模型的优点,使水平集函数演化到目标的边界上;最后,对一些弱边界、灰度不均匀的图像进行仿真实验,结果表明提出的算法能够精准地分割目标,并且具有一定的抗噪性。     

改进符号压力函数的区域活动轮廓模型

利用具有图像增强能力的局部区域信息,定义一种新的符号压力函数(SPF)。用该SPF函数取代GAC模型中的边界停止函数,对GAC模型进行改进,提出一种新的区域活动轮廓模型,从而解决了非同质或弱边界图像的分割问题。继续采用Selective Binary and Gaussian Filtering水平集方法,避免水平集函数的重新初始化,简化新模型。真实图像和合成图像的实验结果表明,新模型与LBF模型具有相同的分割效果,但在计算效率上远优于LBF模型。新模型不仅能够分割非同质或弱边界图像,且具有亚像素分割精确性、抗噪性、局部全局选择分割性等性质。     

基于改进符号距离函数的变分水平集图像分割算法

为保证水平集图像分割算法的稳定性,传统水平集方法常采用重新初始化的方法或引入符号距离函数,但这两种方法存在计算量大或计算不稳定的问题.因此,提出一种基于改进符号距离函数的变分水平集图像分割算法.首先,改进已有的Double-Well型符号距离函数约束项,改进后的约束项可避免重新初始化、提高计算效率,同时也能更好地保证水平集函数演化过程的稳定.然后,利用基于全局灰度信息和局部灰度信息的活动轮廓模型构造能量泛函,该能量函数继承了全局模型和局部模型的优点,可驱动水平集函数准确演化至目标边界,且可动态调整组合权重.最后,引入高斯卷积运算,加快演化速度同时也对水平集函数起到平滑的作用.对人工合成和自然图像的数值实验及与同类模型的对比实验证明,提出的模型具有较高的分割准确度及对噪声和初始轮廓的鲁棒性.     

Active contour model for simultaneous MR image segmentation and denoising

In this paper, a new region-based active contour model is proposed for magnetic resonance image segmentation and denoising based on the global minimization framework and level set evolution. A new region fitting energy based on Nadaraya–Watson estimator and local image information is defined to enforce the curve evolution. By this improved region fitting term, the images with noise and intensity un-uniformity can be segmented and denoised. Inspired by the Perona–Malik diffusion equation, an edge-preserving regularization term is defined through the duality formulation to penalize the length of region boundaries. By this new regularization term, the edge information is utilized to improve the contour?s ability of capturing the edge and remaining smooth during the evolution. The energy functional of the proposed model is minimized by an efficient dual algorithm avoiding the inefficiency of the gradient descent method. Experiments on medical images demonstrate the proposed model provides a hybrid way to perform image segmentation and image denoising simultaneously.     

Novel fuzzy active contour model with kernel metric for image segmentation

In this paper, a novel region-based fuzzy active contour model with kernel metric is proposed for a robust and stable image segmentation. This model can detect the boundaries precisely and work well with images in the presence of noise, outliers and low contrast. It segments an image into two regions – the object and the background by the minimization of a predefined energy function. Due to the kernel metric incorporated in the energy and the fuzziness of the energy, the active contour evolves very stably without the reinitialization for the level set function during the evolution. Here the fuzziness provides the model with a strong ability to reject local minima and the kernel metric is employed to construct a nonlinear version of energy function based on a level set framework. This new fuzzy and nonlinear version of energy function makes the updating of region centers more robust against the noise and outliers in an image. Theoretical analysis and experimental results show that the proposed model achieves a much better balance between accuracy and efficiency compared with other active contour models.     

Adaptive active contour model driven by image data field for image segmentation with flexible initialization

In this paper, a novel adaptive active contour model based on image data field for image segmentation with robust and flexible initializations is proposed. We firstly construct a new external energy term deduced from the image data field that drives the level set function to move in the opposite direction along the boundaries of object and an adaptive length regularization term based on the image local entropy. The designed external energy and length regularization term are then incorporated into a variationlevel set framework with an additional penalizing energy term. Due to the adaptive sign–changing property of the external energy and the adaptive length regularization term, the proposed model can tackle images with clutter background and noise, the level set function can be initialized as any bounded functions (e.g., constant function), which implies the proposed model is robust to initialization of contours. Experimental results on both synthetic and real images from different modalities confirm the effectiveness and competivive performance of the proposed method compared with other representative models.

     

基于双符号压力函数的活动轮廓图像分割方法

为了解决测地线模型和CV模型无法同时对弱边界、灰度不均匀图像进行分割的问题,提出一种基于双符号压力函数的活动轮廓图像分割方法。首先,基于图像统计信息定义分割灰度不均匀图像的符号压力函数,基于内部和外部灰度均值给出轮廓曲线内外的全局区域灰度均值的加权组合函数,运用图像全局信息定义分割弱边界图像的符号压力函数;然后,结合统计信息的符号压力函数和全局信息的符号压力函数（简称“双符号压力函数”）,通过增加组合的权值系数,设计新的水平集演化方程;最后,将双符号压力函数引入到二值选择和高斯滤波正则化水平集模型中,构建一种基于双符号压力函数的活动轮廓图像分割算法。仿真实验结果表明,该算法能够有效地分割弱边界、灰度不均匀的图像,同时对噪声也有一定的抗干扰性。     

Active contours driven by local image fitting energy

A new region-based active contour model that embeds the image local information is proposed in this paper. By introducing the local image fitting (LIF) energy to extract the local image information, our model is able to segment images with intensity inhomogeneities. Moreover, a novel method based on Gaussian filtering for variational level set is proposed to regularize the level set function. It can not only ensure the smoothness of the level set function, but also eliminate the requirement of re-initialization, which is very computationally expensive. Experiments show that the proposed method achieves similar results to the LBF (local binary fitting) energy model but it is much more computationally efficient. In addition, our approach maintains the sub-pixel accuracy and boundary regularization properties.     

An active contour model driven by anisotropic region fitting energy for image segmentation

A novel region active contour model (ACM) for image segmentation is proposed in this paper. In order to perform an accurate segmentation of images with non-homogeneous intensity, the original region fitting energy in the general region-based ACMs is improved by an anisotropic region fitting energy to evolve the contour. Using the local image information described by the structure tensor, this new region fitting energy is defined in terms of two anisotropic fitting functions that approximate the image intensity along the principal directions of variation of the intensity. Therefore, the anisotropic fitting functions extract intensity information more precisely, which enable our model to cope with the boundaries with low-contrast and complicated structures. It is incorporated into a variational formula with a total variation (TV) regularization term with respect to level set function, from which the segmentation process is performed by minimizing this variational energy functional. Experiments on the vessel and brain magnetic resonance images demonstrate the advantages of the proposed method over Chan–Vese (CV) active contours and local binary active contours (LBF) in terms of both efficiency and accuracy.     

结合显著性和边缘信息的水平集图像分割方法

针对 LBF 模型对初始轮廓的依赖性和对边缘的弱控制能力,研究了一种结合显著性和边缘信息 的水平集图像分割方法。首先,结合小波分析理论,基于视觉注意机制构造图像显著图;然后,利用小波分解 所描述的图像边缘信息,构造边缘检测函数,同自适应初始轮廓一起引入到 LBF 水平集模型中,并用有限差 分法进行数值求解。实验结果表明,提出的图像分割方法能有效降低初始轮廓位置对活动轮廓模型的影响,对 合成图像、自然图像均有较好的分割结果,相较于其他传统方法具有更高的演化效率和分割质量。     

基于局部图像拟合偏差的活动轮廓分割模型

针对灰度不均匀图像的分割问题,提出一个基于区域的活动轮廓模型。通过构造包含图像局部信息的局部图像拟合偏差能量泛函,度量真实图像与拟合图像的偏差,并在全局凸分割的基础上,将分裂Bregman技术应用到模型能量泛函的最小化问题中,以提高分割速率。同时引入边界检测函数更加准确地探测边界位置,以提高模型的分割准确性。实验结果表明,该模型不仅可以正确分割灰度不均匀图像和受噪声干扰的图像,而且对于多目标图像以及灰度分布均值相同、方差不同的图像,也能快速、准确地得到分割结果。     

核磁共振图像脑组织自动提取方法

核磁共振图像的脑组织提取是神经图像处理研究中的一个重要步骤。将传统的几何活动轮廓模型与二值水平集函数相结合,提出了一种新型的二值水平集活动轮廓模型,并基于该模型提出了一种能够自动、准确实现MRI脑组织提取的方法。该方法在脑组织内部自动设定最优初始轮廓曲线,将该演化曲线隐含地表示成一个高维函数的零水平集,零水平集在基于区域的图像力驱动下不断演化并达到待分割脑部图像的边缘。将基于该方法的脑组织提取结果与作为金标准的专家手动分割结果和其他流行算法相比较,结果表明提出的脑组织提取方法能够自动、准确和快速地提取MRI脑组织,是一种鲁棒性较好的MRI脑组织提取方法。     

基于自适应符号函数的主动轮廓模型

几何主动轮廓模型的缺点是对初始轮廓位置特别敏感,基于距离规则水平集（DRLSE）模型的初始轮廓曲线必须设置在目标边界的内部或者外部.基于边缘的自适应水平集（ALSE）模型,提出了一种提高初始轮廓鲁棒性的方法.但两种模型均容易出现陷入虚假边界、从弱边缘处泄露以及抗噪声能力差等问题.设计了一个结合自适应符号函数和自适应边缘指示函数的模型,使得主动轮廓演化能根据自适应符号函数的方向从初始轮廓开始自动进行膨胀及收缩,很好地改善了水平集对初始轮廓敏感的缺点,提高了鲁棒性,同时解决了水平集对收敛速度慢以及易从弱边缘处泄露的问题.此外,为了使得模型演化更加稳定,提出了一个新的距离规则项.实验结果表明：自适应符号函数的主动轮廓模型不仅可以提高分割质量,缩短图像分割时间,同时提高了对初始轮廓的鲁棒性.     

一种改进的变分水平集的图像分割算法

为了解决灰度不均匀现象对医学图像的干扰问题,提出了基于局部极性信息的活 动轮廓模型。通过引入局部图像信息,该模型能有效地分割灰度不均匀图像。在规则化项中增 加的能量惩罚项,使得水平集函数在演化过程中保持为近似的符号距离函数。该算法将图像分 割问题归结为曲线能量泛函的最小化,首先建立包含局部灰度信息（极性信息）和改进的符号 距离函数的曲线演化能量泛函;然后采用变分水平集方法求解能量函数的最小值,得到最终的 分割结果。真实医学图像和人工合成图像的实验结果表明,此方法对灰度不均匀的医学图像有 较高的分割精确度,在图像分割速度上有较大提高。由于利用了局部灰度信息,可以有效地分 割灰度不均匀的医学图像,而改进后的变分水平集可以完全避免重新初始化,使得图像分割效 率大大提高了。     

小邻域统计信息核磁共振医学图像分割模型

目的 提出局部统计信息测地线活动轮廓图像分割方法。方法 该方法采用高斯分布拟合图像局部灰度统计特征信息,构造了方向性驱动项。在此基础上,建立了局部统计信息测地线能量泛函。通过极小化该泛函,来驱动演化曲线有序地向目标边界逼近,最后,整个分割过程采用二值水平集方法实现。结果 本文方法降低了灰度不均匀信息影响,达到提取感兴趣区域轮廓目的,提高算法效率和稳定性。结论 实验结果表明,该方法可以快速准确地分割医学感兴趣目标边界。     

An efficient local Chan-Vese model for image segmentation

In this paper, a new local Chan-Vese (LCV) model is proposed for image segmentation, which is built based on the techniques of curve evolution, local statistical function and level set method. The energy functional for the proposed model consists of three terms, i.e., global term, local term and regularization term. By incorporating the local image information into the proposed model, the images with intensity inhomogeneity can be efficiently segmented. In addition, the time-consuming re-initialization step widely adopted in traditional level set methods can be avoided by introducing a new penalizing energy. To avoid the long iteration process for level set evolution, an efficient termination criterion is presented which is based on the length change of evolving curve. Particularly, we proposed constructing an extended structure tensor (EST) by adding the intensity information into the classical structure tensor for texture image segmentation. It can be found that by combining the EST with our LCV model, the texture image can be efficiently segmented no matter whether it presents intensity inhomogeneity or not. Finally, experiments on some synthetic and real images have demonstrated the efficiency and robustness of our model. Moreover, comparisons with the well-known Chan-Vese (CV) model and recent popular local binary fitting (LBF) model also show that our LCV model can segment images with few iteration times and be less sensitive to the location of initial contour and the selection of governing parameters.     

融合区域和测地线的活动轮廓模型与图割相结合的自然图像分割

针对活动轮廓模型利用水平集函数演化来分割图像时,只能分割灰度均匀的图像 问题以及容易陷入能量泛函局部极小值的缺点,提出一种新的图像分割模型。模型将区域中的 局部和全局信息融合的活动轮廓模型与边界模型相结合,然后利用图切割进行优化。实验表明, 该方法对初始曲线不敏感,能分割灰度不均的自然图像,避免陷入局部极小,并能有效提高图 像分割的速度和精度。     

A novel region-based active contour model based on kernel function for image segmentation

It is a difficult task to accurately segment images with intensity inhomogeneity, because most of existing algorithms are based upon the assumption of the homogeneity of image intensity. In this paper, we propose a novel region-based active contour model, referred to as the K-GLIF, which utilizes both global and local image intensity fittings with kernel functions. The model consists of an intensity fitting term and a new regularization term. The intensity fitting term of the level set function is the gradient descent flow that minimizes the global binary fitting energy functional. The local intensity fitting value based on the generalized Gaussian kernel function is then incorporated into the global intensity fitting value to form the weighted intensity fitting value on the two sides of the contour. Owing to the kernel function, the intensity information in local regions is extracted to guide the motion of the contour, which enables the model to effectively segment images with intensity inhomogeneity and smooth noise. A new regularization term is used to control the smoothness of the level set function and avoid complicated re-initialization. Experimental results and comparisons with other models of inhomogeneous images, synthetic images, medical images, multi-object images, natural and infrared images show that the proposed K-GLIF model improves the quality of image segmentation in terms of accuracy and robustness of initial contours.