• Investigative Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.60-65
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• 1999

Purpose : The purpose of this study was to evaluate the image quality, contrast characteristics, and possible clinical utility of Medium Tau Inversion Recovery(MTIR) sequence with white matter suppression in patients with brain cortical lesion. Materials and methods : Two normal volunteers and twenty-one patients with cortical lesion were scanned with MTIR as well as other MR imaging sequences. Gray-white matter contrast was evaluated objectively using region-of-interest calculations, including percent contrast and contrast-to-noise ratio(CNR). MTIR sequence was visually compared with other sequences in 21 patients with cortical lesion including conspicuity and detection rate. Results : MTIR sequence had the highest present contrast and CNR between the gray matter and white matter. In twenty-one cases of cortical lesion including cortical dysplasia, MTIR sequence improved delineation and conspicuity of lesion, but MTIR sequence could not detect new lesions. Conclusion : The MTIR sequence well delineated the cortical lesions, particularly in including cortical dysplasia. It may be used as an adjunctive imaging sequence in case of poor gray and white matter differentiation with conventional T1-weighted sequences.

• Korean Journal of Digital Imaging in Medicine
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.98-101
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• 2002

대조도와 관용도사이의 손실 교환은 투사 방사선 촬영에 있어서 잘 알려져 있고 또한 오랫동안 지속되어온 영상의 질에 있어서의 제약이었다. 전자적인 영상획득의 도입으로 한 영상 내에 넓은 영역의 X-Tay 노출을 포획하는 것이 가능해 졌다. 그러나, 진단에 필요한 세부영역 들을 위해 적절한 대조도를 유지하는 반면, 일반적으로 기대되는 관용도 범위 이외의 정보가 시각화 되어지는 것과 같은 영상의 rendering과 displaying의 문제가 남아 있었다. 이 문서에 묘사되는 EVP(Enhanced Visualization Processing)는 이 문제를 중점적으로 다룬다. 방대한 진단용 CR 영상 데이터베이스로부터 선택된 14개의 검사유형 당 각각 5개의 영상들을 포함한, 총 70개의 영상들을 사용하여 임상 보고서가 제출되었다. 각 영상에 대해, control rendering은 현재 개발되어 있는 automatic tone scaling algorithm(자동 톤 스케일 알고리즘)에 의해 생성되었고, test rendering은 그 control of image에 EVP를 인가함에 의해 생성되었다. 10명의 radiologist들은 각자 개별적으로 140개의 이미지들(70개의 test renderings와 70개의 control renderings)을 9점의 진단 상의 품질 척도로 평가했다. EVP는 세부 대조도의 부당한 손실 없이 증가된 노출 관용도를 제공했다. 많은 영상에서 EVP는 과소 투과 영역에서의 정보의 손실을 줄여주고, 반면 과다 투과 영역의 밝게 빛나는 현상을 실제적으로 감소시켰다. 진단상의 품질 평가는 EVP image와 control image 모두 평균적으로 높았다. 그럼에도 EVP images의 평균 등위는 control image의 그것보다 1 단계 완전히 높은 범위에 있는 것으로 평가되었다. 쌍으로 그 영상들을 보면, EVP images의 76%가 일치하는 control images의 평가 단계보다 1 또는 그 이상 높은 범주인 것으로 평가되었고, 반면 control image의 6% 만이 일치하는 EVP 영상보다 우수한 것으로 평가되었다. 유사한 결과가 연구된 14개의 검사유형에 대해 획득되었다.

• 대한방사선방어학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.04a
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• pp.238-239
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• 2009

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Broadcast Engineers Conference
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• 2014.06a
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• pp.105-106
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• 2014

본 논문에서는 중요도 지도를 사용한 화소값 사이 척력 기반 영상 대조비 향상 기법을 제안한다. 공간상에서 인접한 화소들 사이에 자주 발생하는 화소값들의 차이를 크게 하면 효과적으로 영상의 디테일을 두드러지게 할 수 있다. 대조비 증가를 위해 화소값 사이 척력을 정의하고, 유효 화소값 사이 척력들의 합을 사용하여 대조비의 증가 정도를 조절한다. 중요도 지도는 영상의 화소마다 사람의 시선이 머무르는 정도를 상대적인 수치로 나타낸 것이다. 따라서 영상 화질을 개선할 때 중요도 지도를 사용하면 사람의 시선을 끄는 화소값들의 대조비를 선택적으로 높일 수 있다. 실험 결과를 통하여 제안 기법이 우수한 화질개선 영상을 생성함을 확인한다.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.150-156
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• 2008

An applied technique of contrast enhancement for X-ray image is proposed which is based on combined enhancement of scaling and wavelet coefficients in discrete wavelet transform space. Conventional contrast enhancement methods such as contrast limited adaptive histogram equalization (CLAHE), multi-scale image contrast amplification (MUSICA) and gamma correction were applied on scaling coefficients to enhance the contrast of an original. In order to enhance the detail as well as reduce the blurring caused by up scaling of contrast modified scale coefficients from lower resolution, the sigmoid manipulation function was used to manipulate wavelet coefficients. The contrast detail mammography (CDMAM) phantom was imaged and processed to measure the image line profile of results and contrast to noise ratio (CNR) comparatively. The proposed technique produced better results than direct application of various contrast enhancement methods on image itself. The proposed method can enhance contrast, and also suppress the amplification of noise components in a single process. It could be useful for various applications in medical, industrial and graphical images where contrast and detail are of importance.

• Investigative Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.42-51
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• 2000

Purpose: Projection-type Fast Spin Echo (PFSE) imaging is robust to patient motion or flow related artifact compared to conventional Fast Spin Echo (FSE) imaging, however, it has difficulty in controlling $T_2$ contrast. In this paper, Tz contrast in the PFSE method is analyzed and compared with those of the FSE method with various effective echo times by computer simulation. The contrasts in the FSE and PFSE methods are also compared by experiments with volunteers. From the analysis and simulation, it is shown that ${T_2}-weighted$ images can well be obtained by the PFSE method proposed. Materials and methods: Pulse sequence for the PFSE method is implemented at a 1.0 Tesla whole body MRI system and $T_2$ contrasts in the PFSE and FSE methods are analyzed by computer simulation and experiment with volunteers. For the simulation, a mathematical phantom composed of various $T_2$ values is devised and $T_2$ contrast in the reconstructed image by the PFSE is compared to those by the FSE method with various effective echo times. Multi-slice ${T_2}-weighted$ head images of the volunteers obtained by the PFSE method are also shown in comparison with those by the FSE method at a 1.0 Tesla whole body MRI system. Results: From the analysis, $T_2$ contrast by the PFSE method appears similar to those by the FSE method with the effective echo time in a range of SO-lOOms. Using a mathematical phantom, contrast in the PFSE image appears close to that by the FSE method with the effective echo time of 96ms. From experiment with volunteers, multi-slice $T_2-weighted$ images are obtained by the PFSE method having contrast similar to that of the FSE method with the effective echo time of 96ms. Reconstructed images by the PFSE method show less motion related artifact compared to those by the FSE method. Conclusion: The projection-type FSE imaging acquires multiple radial lines with different angles in polar coordinate in k space using multiple spin echoes. The PFSE method is robust to patient motion or flow, however, it has difficulty in controlling $T_2$ contrast compared to the FSE method. In this paper, it is shown that the PFSE method provides good $T_2$ contrast (${T_2}-weighted$ images) similar to the FSE method by both computer simulation and experiments with volunteers.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.16 no.11
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• pp.1250-1260
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• 2013

The contrast enhancement techniques based on Laplacian pyramid image fusion have a benefit that they can faithfully describe the image information because they combine the multiple resource images by selecting the desired pixel in each image. However, they also have some problem that the output image may contain noise, because the methods evaluate the visual information on the basis of each pixel. In this paper, an improved contrast enhancement method, which effectively suppresses the noise, using image fusion is proposed. The proposed method combines the resource images by making Laplacian pyramids generated from weight maps, which are produced by measuring the difference between the block-based local well exposedness and local homogeneity for each resource image. We showed the proposed method could produce less noisy images compared to the conventional techniques in the test for various images.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.12 no.11
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• pp.407-414
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• 2014

The aim of the present study was to carry out quantitative analysis of spatial resolution for the influence of the focus size and digital image post-processing on the Computed Radiography (CR). The modulation transfer functions of an edge measuring method (MTF) was used for the evaluation of the spatial resolution. The focus size of X-ray tube was used the small focus (0.6 mm) and the large focus (1.2 mm). We evaluated the 50% and 10% of MTF for the enhancement of edge and contrast by using multi-scale image contrast amplification (MUSICA) in digital image post-processing. As a results, the edge enhancement than the contrast enhancement were significantly higher the spatial resolution of MTF 50% in all focus. Also the spatial resolution of the obtained images in a large focus were improved by digital image processing. In conclusion, the results of this study should serve as a basic data for obtain the high resolution clinical images, such as skeletal and chest images on the CR.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.33-40
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• 1999

Purpose: To simulate and measure the signal intensity of various tissues near bone interface in 2D and 3D neurological MR images. Materials and Methods: In neurological proton density (PD) weighted images, every component in the head including cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), muscle and scalp, with the exception of bone, are visualised. It is possible to acquire images in 2D or 3D. A 2D fast spin-echo (FSE) sequence is chosen for the 2D acquisition and a 3D gradient-echo (GE) sequence is chosen for the 3D acquisition. To find out the signal intensities of CSF, muscle and fat (or scalp) for the 2D spin-echo(SE) and 3D gradient-echo (GE) imaging sequences, the theoretical signal intensities for 2D SE and 3D GE were calculated. For the 2D fast spin-echo (FSE) sequence, to produce the PD weighted image, long TR (4000 ms) and short TE$_{eff}$ (22 ms) were employed. For the 3D GE sequence, low flip angle (8$^{\circ}$) with short TR (35 ms) and short TE (3 ms) was used to produce the PD weighted contrast. Results: The 2D FSE sequence has CSF, muscle and scalp with superior image contrast and SNR of 39 - 57 while the 3D GE sequence has CSF, muscle and scalp with broadly similar image contrast and SNR of 26 - 33. SNR in the FSE image were better than those in the GE image and the skull edges appeared very clearly in the FSE image due to the edge enhancement effect in the FSE sequence. Furthermore, the contrast between CSF, muscle and scalp in the 2D FSE image was significantly better than in the 3D GE image, due to the strong signal intensities (or SNR) from CSF, muscle and scalp and enhanced edges of CSF. Conclusion: The signal intensity of various tissues near bone interface in neurological MR images has been simulated and measured. Both the simulation and imaging of the 2D SE and 3D GE sequences have CSF, fat and muscle with broadly similar image intensity and SNR's and have succeeded in getting all tissues about the same signal. However, in the 2D FSE sequence, image contrast between CSF, muscle and scalp was good and SNR was relatively high, imaging time was relatively short.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Broadcast Engineers Conference
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• 2018.11a
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• pp.44-45
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• 2018

본 논문은 감마 보정 기반의 저조도 영상의 대조비 향상을 위한 최적의 계수 추정 기법을 제안한다. 제안하는 기법은 먼저 입력 영상의 휘도 정보를 로그 함수를 이용하여 정규화 한 후, 입력 영상을 밝은 부분과 어두운 부분으로 나눈다. 그런 다음 각각의 영역에서 통계적 특성을 고려한 비용 함수를 정의하고, 컨벡스 최적화 이론을 이용하여 최적의 감마보정 계수를 얻는다. 마지막으로 과포화 현상이 발생을 억제할 수 있는 색상 복원 기법을 적용한다. 컴퓨터 모의실험을 통해 제안하는 기법이 기존 기법에 비해서 낮은 계산 복잡도를 보이면서도 향상된 대조비를 보임을 확인한다.