Contour detection of hippocampus using Dynamic Contour Model and Region Growing

영역확장법과 동적외곽선모델을 이용한 해마(hippocampus)의 외곽선 검출

In hippocampal morphology Abnormalities, including unilateral or bilateral volume loss, are known to occur in epilepsy, Alzheimer's disease, and in certain amnestic syndromes. To detect such abnormalities in hippocampal morphology, we present a method that combines region growing and dynamic contour model to detect hippocampus from MRI brain data. The segmentation process is performed two steps. First region growing with a seed point is performed in the region of hippocampus and the initial contour of dynamic contour model is obtained. Second, the initial contour is modified on the basis of criteria that integrate energy with contour smoothness and the image gradient along the contour. As a result, this method improves fairly sensitivity to the choice of the initial seed point, which is often seen by conventional contour model. The power and practicality of this method have been tested on two brain datasets. Thus, we have developed an effective algorithm to extract hippocampus from MRI brain data.