Identification of presence of brain tumors in MRI

images using contrast enhancement technique

Synopsis
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of degree of
Master of Technology in VLSI

Submitted by
Jivan Jumnake
Guided by

Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering

GH Raisoni Academy of Engineering and Technology, Nagpur

(Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University, Nagpur)

Session 2017-2018
 Certificate

The synopsis titled Identification of presence of brain tumors in MRI images

using contrast enhancement technique submitted by Jivan Jumnake, student of
third semester M.Tech. (VLSI) as part of the degree of Master of Technology in
VLSI Engineering by Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University shall be
carried out under my/our supervision in the Department of Electronics and
Communication Engineering at GH Raisoni Academy of Engineering and
Technology during the academic session 2016-2017. The proposed subject of
research and the synopsis enclosed herewith have my approval.

Project Guide
 Contents

1. Abstract

2. Introduction

3. Literature review

4. Objective

5. Methodology

6. Proposed plan of work

7. Conclusion and future work

8. References
 ABSTRACT

Image processing is an active research area in which medical image processing is a highly challenging
field. Medical imaging techniques are used to image the inner portions of the human body for medical
diagnosis. Brain tumor is a serious life altering disease condition. Image segmentation plays a significant
role in image processing as it helps in the extraction of suspicious regions from the medical images. In
this synopsis we have proposed segmentation of brain MRI image using image contrast enhancement
technique followed by feature based classification which avoids the wrongly clustered regions that can
inevitably be formed after segmentation of the brain MRI image for detection of tumor location.
 1. INTRODUCTION

Automatic Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a noninvasive medical imaging technique used in
Computer- aided diagnosis (CAD) to visualize detailed internal structure and limited functions of the
body such as brain diseases, Alzheimer disease or movement's disorders such as Parkinson. The
diagnostic values of MRI are greatly magnified by the automatic and accurate classification of the MR
images. Different algorithms are exposed in each step on automatic brain tumor detection; this process
has its appropriate methods. One of the most powerful methods for extraction is Wavelet transform. This
is an effective tool for 2D image feature extraction because it allows for the analysis of images at various
levels of resolution. The main advantage of wavelet is that it affords localized frequency information
about the function of a signal, which is particularly beneficial for classification [1]. Wavelet is applied to
reduction of samples and removes high frequency noises. However, it requires large storage and is
computationally more expensive. Hence an alternative method for dimension reduction scheme is used. In
order to reduce the feature vector dimensions and increase the discriminative power, the Simulated
Annealing (SA) algorithm and optimization process is used. SA is engaging since it capably reduces the
dimensionality of the data and therefore reduces the computational cost of analyzing new data. This
method is used for feature reduction in [2]. In recent years, many viable algorithms are presented for
feature selection and optimization. Genetic Algorithms (GA) are realized as computer programs that have
been very successful in many optimization areas. After obtaining the features set, we need to construct a
classifier. Also at classification step different algorithms are presented. The first category is unsupervised
classification; the other category is supervised classification such as support vector machine (SVM) that
classifies points by allowing them to one of two disjoint half spaces. These half spaces are either in the
original input space of the problem for linear classifiers, or in a higher dimensional feature space for
nonlinear classifiers. S VM is used for classification as it gives better accuracy and performance than
other classifiers [1].

In current clinical practice, MR brain tumor images are assessed visually or assessed by using basic
quantitative measures such as largest diameter to make a diagnosis or assess a treatment. This approach is
time-consuming and has drawbacks regarding reproducibility and inter-rater variability. Development of
interactive or fully-automated MRI brain tumor segmentation methods is an ongoing field of research. By
comparing manual segmentations from individual raters with the consensus segmentation of a group of
raters, an upper limit for the performance of (semi-)automated methods is de- rived in Menze et al. [2]. It
is shown that state-of-the-art segmentation methods still underperform significantly com- pared to this
upper limit and more effort is needed to bring the methods into daily clinical practice.

Brain tumor is one of the prime causes behind the increase in mortality among people. A tumor is an
abnormal growth caused by cells reproducing themselves in an uncontrolled manner. Does anybody know
the obvious reason, why brain tumor occurs? My guess, unfortunately the answer is 'no'. Matter of hope is
that regardless of the type of tumor whether it's benign or malignant, primary or metastatic, all brain
tumors are treatable. But there is a big 'if. It is the tumor must be detected in early stages of formation
with all essential information of size, location, shape. Then surgeons and physicians can curtail this brain
anomaly and cure the patient permanently. At present with the involvement of high resolution diagnostic
techniques e.g. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Computed Tomography (CT), functional MRI
(fMRI), Positron Emission Tomography (PET), Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography
(SPECT) in medical imaging we have gained more knowledge about brain tumor than last hundred years.
Now imaging facilitates secondary prevention by offering the detection of tumors in developing stages
before symptoms start appearing. Early detection usually results in less extensive treatment and better
outcomes. Detection of tumors by image processing is known to reduce the mortality subsequently. A
sublime awareness can also be created in this regard.
Tumor is an uncontrolled growth of cancer cells in any part of the body. Tumors are of different types and
have different characteristics and different treatments[1] . At present, brain tumors are classified as
primary brain tumors and metastatic brain tumors. The former begin in the brain and tend to stay in the
brain, the latter begin as a cancer elsewhere in the body and spreading to the brain. Brain tumors are
divided into two types: benign and malignant. In fact, the most widely used grading scheme has been
issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) [2] . It classifies brain tumors into grade I to IV under
the microscope. In general, grade I and grade II are benign brain tumor (low-grade); grade III and grade
IV are malignant brain tumor (high-grade). Usually, if low-grade brain tumor is not treated, it is likely to
deteriorate to high-grade brain tumor. The 2012 CBTRUS (Central Brain Tumor Registry of the United
States) Statistical Report has also showed that brain tumors are the second leading cause of cancer-related
deaths in children under age 20 and in males ages 20- 39 (leukemia is the first) and the fifth leading cause
of cancer-related deaths in females ages 20-39. An estimated 69 720 new cases of primary brain tumors
were expected to be diagnosed in 2013 and included both malignant (24 620) and non-malignant (45 100)
brain tumors. This estimate is based on an application of age-sex-race-specific incidence rates from the
2013 CBTRUS Statistical Report using SEER and NPCR data to project 2013 US population estimates
for the respective age-sex-race groups (www.abta.org/about- us/news/brain-tumor-statistics/). Therefore,
brain tumors are seriously endangering peoples lives and early discovery and treatment have become a
necessity. In the clinical aspect, treatment options for brain tumor include surgery, radiation therapy or
chemotherapy. Along with the advance of medical imaging, imaging modalities play an important role in
the evaluation of patients with brain tumors and have a significant impact on patient care.

Recent years, the emerging new imaging modalities, such as X- Ray, Ultrasonography, Computed
Tomography (CT), Magneto Encephalography (MEG), Electro Encephalography (EEG), Positron
Emission Tomography (PET), Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT), and Magnetic
Resonance Imaging (MRI), not only show the detailed and complete aspects of brain tumors, but also
improve clinical doctors to study the mechanism of brain tumors at the aim of better treatment. Clinical
doctors play an important role in brain tumor assessment and therapy. Once a brain tumor is clinically
suspected, radiologic evaluation is required to determine the location, the extent of the tumor, and its
relationship to the surrounding structures. This information is very important and critical in deciding
between the different forms of therapy such as surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. Therefore, the
evaluation of brain tumors with imaging modalities is now one of the key issues of radiology
departments. MRI is a non-invasive and good soft tissue contrast imaging modality, which provides
invaluable information about shape, size, and localization of brain tumors without exposing the patient to
a high ionization radiation[3] . MRI is attracting more and more attentions for the brain tumor diagnosis
in the clinical [4] . In current clinical routine, the images of different MRI sequences are employed for the
diagnosis and delineation of tumor compartments. These sequence images include T1-weighted MRI
(T1w), T1-weighted MRI with contrast enhancement (T1wc), T2-weighted MRI (T2w), Proton Density-
weighted MRI (PDw), FLuid-Attenuated Inversion Recovery (FLAIR), etc. Figure 1 shows an axial slice
of four standard sequences for a glioblastoma (a type of brain tumor) patient [5] . Since T1w allows for an
easy annotation of the healthy tissues, it has become the most commonly used sequence images for the
brain tumor structure analysis. Moreover, T1-weighted contrast-enhanced sequence images can make the
brain tumor borders become brighter because the contrast agent accumulates there due to the disruption of
the blood-brain barrier in the proliferative brain tumor region. In these sequence images, the necrotic core
and the active cell region can be distinguished easily. In T2w, the edema region can appear brighter than
other sequence images of MRI. Since the signal of water molecules is suppressed in the imaging process
of FLAIR, FLAIR is regarded as a highly effective sequence image to help separate the edema region
from the CSF. Due to the large amount of brain tumor images that are currently being generated in the
clinics, it is not possible for clinicians to manually annotate and segment these images in a reasonable
time. Hence, the automatic segmentation has become inevitable. Brain tumor segmentation is to segment
abnormal tissues such as active cells, necrotic core, and edema from normal brain tissues including GM,
WM, and CSF[6].
In recent years, medical imaging and soft computing have made significant advancements in the field of
brain tumor segmentation. In general, most of abnormal brain tumor tissues may be easily detected by
brain tumor segmentation methods. But accurate and reproducible segmentation results and representation
of abnormalities have not been solved all the way. Since brain tumor segmentation has great impact on
diagnosis, monitoring, treatment planning for patients, and clinical trials, this work focuses on MRI-based
brain tumor segmentation and presents a relatively detailed overview for the current existing methods of
MRI-based brain tumor segmentation.
 2. LITERATURE REVIEW

A Survey of MRI-Based Brain Tumor Segmentation Methods

Jin Liu, Min Li, Jianxin Wang, Fangxiang Wu, Tianming Liu, and Yi Pan
IEEE International Conference on Biomedical Image Analysis 2015

This paper has provided a comprehensive overview of the state of the art MRI-based brain tumor
segmentation methods. Many of the current brain tumor segmentation methods operate MRI images due
to the non-invasive and good soft tissue contrast of MRI and employ classification and clustering methods
by using different features and taking spatial information in a local neighborhood into account. The
purpose of these methods is to provide a preliminary judgment on diagnosis, tumor monitoring, and
therapy planning for the physician.

Although most of brain tumor segmentation algorithms have relatively good results in the field of medical
image analysis, there is a certain distance in clinical applications. Due to a lack of interaction between
researchers and clinicians, clinicians still rely on manual segmentation for brain tumor in many cases. The
existence of many tools aims to do pure research and is hardly useful for clinicians. Therefore, embedding
the developed tools into more user- friendly environments will become inevitable in the future. Recently,
some standard clinical acquisition protocols focusing on feasibility studies are trying to formulate to
improve the clinical applications more quickly. Apart from the evaluation of accuracy and validity for the
results of brain tumor segmentation, computation time is also an important criterion. The current standard
computation time is in general a few minutes. The real-time segmentation will be hard to achieve, but
computation time over a few minutes is unacceptable in clinical routine. Another crucial aspect for brain
tumor segmentation methods is robustness. If an automatic segmentation technique fails in some cases,
clinicians will lose their trust and not use this technique. Therefore, the robustness is also one of the major
assessment criteria for each new method applied in clinical practice. Some current brain tumor
segmentation methods provide robust results within a reasonable computation time.

Although the main attention of many researchers is brain tumor segmentation algorithms and not the
feature extraction for brain tumor, the latter might be more important especially when considering the
variance in appearance of different brain tumor grades and types in actual applications. In the future, the
feature extraction for brain tumor might be worthwhile to take a closer look at relevant and meaningful
features and would be interesting to explore how new features can be designed to obtain better results.
This could improve the accuracy, validity, and robustness of MRI-based brain tumor segmentation.

MRI-based brain tumor segmentation techniques have already shown great potential in detecting and
analyzing tumors in clinical practice and will undoubtedly continue to be improved in the future. With the
development of MRI techniques, more advanced MRI modalities such as Magnetic Resonance
Spectroscopy (MRS), Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI), and Perfusion Imaging (PI) are gaining more
attention in the brain tumor segmentation. For example, a group called Section of Biomedical Image
Analysis (SBIA) has worked on these modalities for over 15 years. These modalities can be used for the
localization of the different areas of the brain tumor. PI data , DTI data , and MRS data have been used to
segment brain tumor from normal tissues by the existence of machine learning methods. Along with the
advance of studies in the area, brain tumor automatic segmentation technology has the potential to
provide better prognostic information and optimize treatment options.
Automatic Detection, Extraction and Mapping of Brain Tumor from MRI Scanned Images using
Frequency Emphasis Homomorphic and Cascaded Hybrid Filtering Techniques.
Rana Banik. Md. Rabiul Hasan, Md. Saif Iftekhar
IEEE Int'l Conf. on Electrical Engineering and Information & Communication Technology 2015

The methods now present to detect brain tumors are generally three types: atlas-based methods [I, 2],
feature-based methods [3, 4, 5, 6] symmetry-property-based methods [7, 8, 9]. The methods mentioned
above are mostly semi-automatic which require the intervention of user to work with the data and process
results. The method we present in this paper is completely automatic. Here we use the most basic property
of MRI images, which is the 'intensity difference'. To isolate the tumor from other regions the intensity
property is enhanced by efficient use of frequency emphasis. Homomorphic high pass filter based on
Gaussian equation is used which intensifies the difference in luminosity between healthy tissues and
malignant tumor affected tissues.

This method is modification of standard homomorphic filtering technique. Typically homomorphic filter
technique adopts only the real values where we dealt absolute values. Besides illumination characteristics
in Brain Tumor Imaging is a new aspect what this paper incorporates. The main contribution made in this
paper is to use multiplicative constant rather than exponential function with homomorphic filter. High
pass filter also reduces frequency domain Gaussian noises. After that tumor intensity is clearly segregated
from other regions like WM(white matter), GM(gray matter), background. Spatial noises are eliminated
by using hybrid filter which is a cascaded combination of Median and Wiener filters. Then other spatial
filters are also used in cascaded form to enhance the noise removing efficiency of this algorithm. The
other redundant regions which intensity or pixel information matches to tumors like CSF (cerebral spinal
fluid), intracranial skulls are separated by simple watershed method. After thresholding, morphological
operations are applied in recurrence to ensure the accurate and approximate detection of tumors according
to its size, shape, position. Then the tumor region is extracted and it's mapped in the edge detected brain
image to its right shape, size and position. Thus by implementing this simple, efficient algorithm on MRI
scanned images a surgeon or radiologist can get to know the particular brain tumor of patient. This
method is tested over multiple real patient images and the results are verified by medical experts. This
method doesn't include the extensive process of maxima transform The role of extended maxima
transform is to identify groups of pixels that are significantly higher than their immediate
surrounding[10].

Most of the processes to detect brain tumors are based on extensive, complicated mathematics and
equations. This method we present here is very simple and focuses on the extraction of the desired regions
rather complex mathematics which will help radiologists to understand this process easily. This method
presented here is completely automatic that means it does not require any user intervention alike
ROI(region of interest) based methods. Moreover though it's not tested on multiple tumors in same image
due to lack of data. But this method can also detect and extract with multiple tumor cases.

This is not symmetry or atlas detection based method so it can operate without any pre-condition of the
tumor. Edge mapping used in our work not only shows the intracranial skull like other methods but also
shows the abnormality as well as other brain tissues which is one of the main contributions of our work.
The filter combination of Homomorphic filter with frequency emphasis and hybrid filter takes the
filtering to a new extent of eliminating noises.

We applied Gaussian high pass filter in our experiment but in case of Homomorphic filtering Butterworth
high pass filter equation works much better. Application of Fuzzy logic in this method for segmentation
could have launched new scope of processing. In order to make this method simple for medical use we
intentionally avoided Fuzzy Clustering methods. Gaussian noise and other noises were preferred as
premonition in our work. So we didn't use noise estimation. Noise estimation gives quality and quantity
of different noises. So using Noise estimation technique filter efficiency would have been better.

AN UNTRAINED AND UNSUPERVISED METHOD FOR MRI BRAIN TUMOR SEGMENTATION

Tom Haecka, Frederik Maesa Paul Suetens
IEEE International Conference on Biomedical Image Processing 2016

In this work we have presented an untrained and unsupervised MRI brain tumor segmentation method,
which makes the method well suited for clinical or research settings for which only a limited amount of
patient images needs to be segmented, or not sufficient annotated training data are avail- able. The
problem is formulated as an L1-regularized optimization problem and is solved by a split Bregman
iteration technique, which guides the search for outlier voxels towards a global optimum. By using spatial
priors of WM, GM and CSF, this global optimum coincides with the clinically meaningful notion of
normal and tumor regions. On the BraTS 2012-2013 training data, the presented method performs better
than the unsupervised Bayesian method by Menze et al.

Diagnose Brain Tumor Through MRI Using Image Processing Clustering Algorithms Such As Fuzzy C
Means Along With Intelligent Optimization Techniques
N. Nandha Gopal, Dr. M. Karnan
IEEE Symposium on Pattern Recognition and Image Analysis, 2010

A Review of the significant result obtained in the course of the work and scope for future research are
highlighted in this work. The primary objective of this thesis is to develop more accurate, efficient for
detection of brain tumor. A novel approaches to segmentation using image processing clustering
algorithm such as Fuzzy C Means and optimization tools such as GA and PS0 were proposed. In
Preprocessing and enhancement the proposed method has been used to remove the film artifacts using
tracking algorithm. In the enhancement stage for remove high frequency components, the Median is used
to enhance the image and the performance of the system was investigated.

Segmentation was done by Fuzzy C Means along with metaheuristic algorithms such as GA and PSO.
The population based optimization Genetic algorithm is investigated in that the pixel intensity values
were considered as population strings, reproduction was applied to those strings to generate parent strings
using fitness values. Crossover and mutation operator were used to generate the new population. The
optimum value was considered to select the initial cluster point to find the adaptive value (the output of
the FCM) for tumor detection. In that 33, 55, 77, 99, 1111 windows are analyzed the GA with
Fuzzy C Means of 33 window is chosen based on the high contrast than 55, 77, 99, and 1111.

In the PSO the optimum value was considered to select the initial cluster point to find the adaptive value
(the output of the FCM) for tumor detection. In that 33, 55, 77, 99, 1111 windows are analyzed the
PSO with FCM of 33 window is chosen based on the high contrast than 55, 77, 99, and 1111. In
performance of the MRI image in terms of weight vector, execution time and tumor pixels detected using
the PSO with Fuzzy C Means. PSO which is computationally very efficient optimization technique is
proposed for brain tumor image segmentation. The proposed method is relatively simple, reliable, and
efficient. The efficiency was compared with GA. PSO provides better performance comparing with GA.
PSO with FCM algorithm has been used to find out the optimum value. It can be concluded that the
proposed approach has lower tumor value and lesser execution time. There is a decrease beyond 80% in
both the values when compared to any other existing approach.

The average classification error of GA is 0.078%. The average accuracy GA is 89.6%. PSO gives best
classification accuracy and average error rate. The Average classification error of PSO is 0.059% and the
accuracy is 92.8% and tumor detection is 98.87%. The average classification error is reduced when the
number of sample is increased. The results have provided substantial evidence that for brain tumor
segmentation of PSO algorithm performed well.

MRI Brain Cancer Classification Using Support Vector Machine

Hari Babu Nandpuru Dr. S. S. Salankar Prof. V. R. Bora
2014 IEEE Students' Conference on Electrical, Electronics and Computer Science

Automated and efficient diagnosis of medical images is very important. Computer and Information
Technology are very much useful in medical image processing, medical analysis and classification. More
often Medical images are usually obtained by X-rays and MRI. MRI is essential tool in the clinical and
surgical environment due to superior soft tissue differentiation, high spatial resolution, contrast and it
does not use any harmful ionizing radiation which may affect patients. Cancer develops in a part of the
body when cells begin to grow out abnormally. Radiologists examine MRI Images based on visual
interpretation to identify the presence of tumor. There might be a possibility when large volume of MRI
to be analyzed then there is a possibility of wrong diagnosis by radiologists because sensitivity of the
human eye decreases with escalating number of cases, predominantly when only a small number of slices
are affected. Hence there is a need for efficient automated systems for analysis and classification of
medical images. The MRI image may contain both normal and abnormal image.

The methodology includes following modules: Image preprocessing, Features extraction, Feature
reduction Training and Classification/Testing.

Image preprocessing is used to improve the quality of images. Medical images are corrupted by different
type of noises like Rician noise etc. It is very important to have good quality of images for accurate
observations for the given application. Median filter is simple to understand. It preserves brightness
differences resulting in minimal blurring of regional boundaries. It also preserves the positions of
boundaries in an image, making this method useful for visual examination and measurement.

Feature extraction refers to various quantitative measurement of medical images typically used for
decision making regarding the pathology of a structure or tissue. In image processing, feature extraction is
a special form of dimensionality diminution. When the input data to an algorithm is too large to be
processed and it is assumed to be disgracefully unnecessary then the input data will be transformed into a
compact representation set of features. Transforming the input data set into the set of features is called
feature extraction. If the extracted features are cautiously selected, it is expected that the features set will
extract the important information from the input data in order to perform the desired task using this
reduced representation instead of the full size input.

Principle Component Analysis (PCA) [4] is used to reduce the dimensionality of data i.e. reduced
features. Martinez and Kak showed that if training sets are small comparing to feature dimension, PCA
can outperform LDA [13].

The reduced features are submitted to a support vector machine for training and testing. Therefore this
method will decrease the computation time and complexity.

Classifiers such as SVM, K-Nearest Neighbor (KNN), Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Probabilistic
Neural Network (PNN), Hidden Markov Model (HM), etc. are used for various applications such as hand
written digit identification, object identification, speaker identification, face identification, text
classification and for medical applications. Each of the classification schemes previously mentioned has
its own unique properties and associated strengths and problems. In KNN, the major limitation is that it
uses all features in distance computation ally intensive, mainly when the size of training set increases.
Beside this, the accuracy of k- nearest neighbor classification is severely degraded by the presence of
noisy or not related features, mainly when the number of attributes grows. In PNN, limitations is that it is
slower than multilayer perceptron networks at classifying new cases and it requires more memory space
to store the model. ANN, it performs better than other than other classification method with high
dimensional features and contradictory data. But the high computing cost which consumes high CPU and
physical memory usage is the main disadvantage of ANN. Bayesian approach outstanding with its
simplicity and low computational cost in both the training and classifying stage and it has been widely
implemented in various types of domains and applications. But this generative method has been reported
to be less accurate than the discriminative methods such as SVM. SVM has shown to be more accurate
than other classification approaches [14].

The classification process is divided into two parts i.e. the training and the testing part. Firstly, in the
training part known data are given to the classifier for training. Secondly, in the testing part, unknown
data are given to the classifier and the classification is performed after training part. The accuracy rate and
error rate of the classification depends on the efficiency of the training.

Brain Tumor Detection in MRI: Technique and Statistical Validation

K. M. Iftekharuddin J. Zheng M. A. Islam
IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 2004

Among many texture analysis methods, Fractal Dimension (FD) analysis is a useful tool in characterizing
textural images and surface roughness [ 10]. We have successfully exploited the fractal models in
analyzing brain tumor in MRI [6, 7, 11]. Further, the stochastic fractal Brownian motion (fBm) 12],
which offers a framework for integration of fractal and multi-resolution analysis, can successfully
describe the tumor characteristics [13]. Thus, the fractal analysis combining with multi-resolution analysis
(MRA) is a promising candidate in characterizing the content of an image in general and segmenting the
tumor in particular.

The fractal feature is obtained using Piecewise-Triangular-Prism-Surface-Area (PTPSA) algorithm [6, 7].
The fractal wavelet feature is computed using our novel fBm model that integrates both fractal and
multiresolution wavelet analysis for tumor tissue detection [8, 13]. The Self-Organizing Maps (SOM)
algorithm is used as the segmentation tool. Two classification methods, such as a neural network and
Support Vector Machine (SVM) are used to classify the tumor segments, respectively.

In this work, we exploit the effectiveness of fusing two novel fractal-based features with intensity values
to segment and classify tumor regions from non-tumor regions in multimodality pediatric brain MR
images. Our simulation results show the feature fusion of our two novel fractal-based features along with
intensity values offer excellent tumor segmentation and classification results when compared to other
texture based technique. We plan to explore algorithms for specific tumor type detection on MR images
as well as to improve the sensitivity of current algorithms for general tumor cases in future.

Brain Tumor Extraction From MRI Image Using Mathematical Morphological Reconstruction
Yamini Sharma Yogesh K. Meghrajani, Member, IEEE
IEEE Conference on Biomedical Engineering, 2014

In this work the authors propose a method for extracting brain tumor from labeled MRI images affected
by impulse noise. Using global thresholding method, grayscale image converts to binary image. Then
morphological opening by reconstruction operation is applied that consists of two steps i.e. erosion by
disk structuring element (SE) followed by a morphological reconstruction. Eroded image of the first step
provides marker point at tumor region and is used as a marker image for the second step. This
morphological operation removes salt noise, labels, and provides binary image containing tumor as a
foreground. The proposed algorithm works well for almost uniform tumor region else, tumor is eroded
completely in first step. Hence, the proposed algorithm is revised by incorporating hole filling algorithm
based on morphological reconstruction. The revised algorithm fills the non-uniform portion and retains
the marker point of tumor. Furthermore, morphological closing operation is applied for removing pepper
noise of tumor region. Finally, tumor region is extracted by multiplying resultant image with input MRI
image.

The proposed method presents brain tumor extraction using mathematical morphological reconstruction
operations. In this technique, input image is considered as labeled image and affected by impulse noise.
Brain tumor is extracted using pro- posed method besides impulse noise and label or artifacts are
removed. Experimental results are presented for uniform and non-uniform intensity images. The proposed
method performs well if the width of tumor is larger than the radius of the SE. The proposed method is
also compared with other well-known algorithms.
3. PROBLEM STATEMENT:

WITH the fast advance of technologies and the prevalence of imaging devices, billions of digital images
are being created every day. Due to undesirable light source, unfavor- able weather or failure of the
imaging device itself, the contrast and tone of the captured image may not always be satisfactory.
Therefore, image enhancement is often required for both the aesthetic and pragmatic purposes. Tone
mapping tech-niques, e.g. the widely known gamma correction, are used to transfer the image into a
suitable dynamic range.

Abnormal growth of cells inside the skull is brain tumor. Two types of tumor based on growth exists that
are benign (non-cancerous) and malignant (cancerous) tumors. Benign tumors are slow growing tumors,
and malignant tumors, are rapid growing tumors that can spread into surrounding brain. Tumors harm the
regular brain cells functioning by producing inammation, exerting pressure on brain parts and raising
pressure within the skull [1].

An effective method is required to detect the presence of malignant tumors automatically in brain MRI
images. Poor contrast in the images poses a challenge for correct tumor identification. An appropriate
image enhancement technique is required to overcome this challenge.
4. OBJECTIVES:

1. Brain MRI image enhancement using histogram contrast enhancement algorithm.

2. Image segmentation using clustering algorithm.
3. Feature extraction using texture algorithm.
4. Feature reduction using principal component analysis algorithm.
5. Classifier training using support vector machine algorithm.
 5. PROPOSED METHODOLOGY

Due to the large amount of brain tumor images that are currently being generated in the clinics, it is not
possible for clinicians to manually annotate and segment these images in a reasonable time. Hence, the
automatic segmentation has become inevitable. Brain tumor segmentation is to segment abnormal tissues
such as active cells, necrotic core, and edema (Fig. 1) from normal brain tissues including GM, WM, and
CSF[6].

Fig 1: Three main regions of brain tumor

The methodology used to classify MRI image of human brain is shown in Fig. 1. This method uses the
steps of preprocessing, feature extraction, feature reduction, training, storing the database and testing.
Initially MRI images are given as input to the classifiers for training, then the features of new MRI
images are given as input, based on the training, trained classifier classify it efficiently. It performs better
than other classification method with high dimensional features and contradictory data. But the high
computing cost which consumes high CPU and physical memory usage is the main disadvantage of ANN.
Bayesian approach outstanding with its simplicity and low computational cost in both the training and
classifying stage and it has been widely implemented in various types of domains and applications. But
this generative method has been reported to be less accurate than the discriminative methods such as
SVM. SVM has shown to be more accurate than other classification approaches.
 Fig 2: Brain tumor detection methodology

MRI brain image is a RGB image. This image is first converted into gray scale image. Gray scale image
is also known as an intensity image. Array of class pixel values specify intensity values. For single and
double arrays, values range from [0, 1]. For uint8, values range from [0,255]. For uintl6, values range
from [0, 65535]. For intl6, values range from [-32768, 32767]. Intensity or brightness of an image as two
dimensional continuous function F(x, y) where (x, y) denotes the spatial coordinates when only the
brightness of light is considered.

Filtering is the process of removing noise from MRI images. Medical images are corrupted with different
kinds of noise while image acquisition. In this paper median filter is used to remove noise from the MRI
images.

Skull masking means the removal of non-brain tissue like scalp, skull, fat, eyes, neck, etc, from MRI
brain image. It helps to improve the speed and accuracy of diagnostic and predictive procedures in
medical applications. This procedure is also referred as Brain-Extraction/Skull-Stripping [2]. Dilation and
erosion are two fundamental morphological operations. An opening is erosion followed by dilation with
the same structuring element:

Erosion removes pixels on object boundaries in an image. Dilation adds pixels to the boundaries of
objects in an image. The number of pixels added or removed from the objects in an image depends on the
size and shape of the structuring element used to process the image.
Image enrichment is a very basic image processing task that defines us to have a better subjective
decision over the images. Power law Transformation [2] is used for image enrichment. Image enrichment
simply means the transformation an image f into image g using T. The values of pixels in images f and g
are denoted by r and s. As said, the pixel values r and s are related by the expression,

S = T(r)

Feature extraction calculates features on the basis of which image can be easily classified as normal or
abnormal one. The feature extraction is the process to represent raw image to facilitate decision making
such as pattern classification. Features will be extracted from the tumor regions from MRI images.
Feature extraction involves reducing the amount of data required to describe a large set of data accurately.
Features are used as inputs to classifiers that assign them to the class that they represent. The intention of
feature extraction is to reduce the original data by measuring positive properties, or features, that
discriminate one input sample from another sample. Following features are extracted.

Gray Scale
Texture
Symmetrical

Accordingly, 3 kinds of features are extracted, which tell the structure information of gray scale,
symmetrical and texture [1]. These features certainly have some redundancy, but the idea behind this is to
find the potential by useful features.

Excessive features used for classification not only increase computation time but also increase storage
memory. They sometimes make classification more complicated. It is required to reduce the number of
features to overcome the above mentioned problem.

PCA [4] is a proficient tool to reduce the dimension of a data set consisting of a large number of
interconnected variables while retaining most of the variations. Reduce dimension means reduced feature
set which is act as an input to the SVM during training part as well as testing part. Steps to be followed in
PCA:
Compute the mean of the data matrix
Subtract the mean from each image.
Compute the covariance matrix.
Compute the Eigen vectors and values for covariance matrix.
Arrange the Eigen vectors according to the Eigen values and as per the threshold value.
Compute the feature matrix (the space that will use it to project the testing image on it).

SVM algorithm was first developed in 1963 by Vapnik and Lerner. SVM [12] is a binary classifier based
on supervised learning which gives better result than other classifiers. SVM classifies between two
classes by constructing a hyperplane in high-dimensional feature space which can be used for
classification. SVM is a classification algorithm, which is based on different kernel methods. SVM is
classified in two groups.
 6. PLAN OF WORK

Literature review 1 month

Study and implementation of image enhancement algorithm 1 month
Study and implementation of clustering algorithm 1 month
Study and implementation of texture feature algorithm 1 month
Study and implementation of feature reduction algorithm 1 month
Study and implementation of classification algorithm 1 month
Training and testing of classifier 1 month
Result analysis 1 month
Thesis writing 1 month
 7. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK

Segmentation of brain image is imperative in surgical planning and treatment planning in the field of
medicine. In this work, we have proposed a computer aided system for brain MR image segmentation for
detection of tumor location using K - means clustering algorithm followed by morphological filtering,
feature extraction, and classification.

This method we present here works on grayscale images. With the advances of medical imaging color
images are replacing binary and gray images. In future we wish to expand our work in color scan images
to give a better visual optimization as well as 3D images if possible. Though Gaussian Homomorphic
filter gave the desired output efficiently but Butterworth window will be applied in this method in future.
Area or percentage of tumor with respect to brain can also be a plausible work which will empower us by
informing the growth and rate of increasing of tumor.
 8. REFERENCES

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