3D Pulmonary Airway Color Image Reconstruction via Shape from Shading and Virtual Bronchoscopy Imaging Techniques

摘要

The dependence on macro-optical imaging of the human body in the assessment of possible disease is rapidly increasing concurrent with, and as a direct result of, advancements made in medical imaging technologies. Assessing the pulmonary airways through bronchoscopy is performed extensively in clinical practice however remains highly subjective due to limited visualization techniques and the lack of quantitative analyses. The representation of 3D structures in 2D visualization modes, although providing an insight to the structural content of the scene, may in fact skew the perception of the structural form. We have developed two methods for visualizing the optically derived airway mucosal features whilst preserving the structural scene integrity. Shape from shading (SFS) techniques can be used to extract 3D structural information from 2D optical images. The SFS technique presented addresses many limitations previously encountered in conventional techniques resulting in high-resolution 3D color images. The second method presented to combine both color and structural information relies on combined CT and bronchoscopy imaging modalities. External imaging techniques such as CT provide a means of determining the gross structural anatomy of the pulmonary airways, however lack the important optically derived mucosal color. Virtual bronchoscopy is used to provide a direct link between the CT derived structural anatomy and the macro-optically derived mucosal color. Through utilization of a virtual and true bronchoscopy matching technique we are able to directly extract combined structurally sound 3D color segments of the pulmonary airways. Various pulmonary airway diseases are assessed and the resulting combined color and texture results are presented demonstrating the effectiveness of the presented techniques.