Digital image processing and pattern recognition techniques for the detection of cancer

摘要

Cancer isthesecondleadingcauseofdeathforbothmenand women intheworld,andisexpectedtobecometheleadingcause of deathinthenextfewdecades.Inrecentyears,cancerdetection has becomeasignificantareaofresearchactivitiesintheimagepro-cessing andpatternrecognitioncommunity.Medicalimagingtech-nologies havealreadymadeagreatimpactonourcapabilitiesof detecting cancerearlyanddiagnosingthediseasemoreaccurately.In ordertofurtherimprovetheefficiencyandveracityofdiagnoses and treatment,imageprocessingandpatternrecognitiontechniques have beenwidelyappliedtoanalysisandrecognitionofcancer,eval-uation oftheeffectivenessoftreatment,andpredictionofthedevel-opment ofcancer.Theaimofthisspecialissueistobringtogether researchers workingonimageprocessingandpatternrecognition techniques forthedetectionandassessmentofcancer,andtopro-mote researchinimageprocessingandpatternrecognitionforon-cology. Anumberofpapersweresubmittedtothisspecialissueand each waspeer-reviewedbyatleastthreeexpertsinthefield.From these submittedpapers,17werefinallyselectedforinclusionin this specialissue.Theseselectedpaperscoverabroadrangeoftop-ics thatarerepresentativeofthestate-of-the-artincomputer-aided detection ordiagnosis(CAD)ofcancer.Theycoverseveralimaging modalities (suchasCT,MRI,andmammography)anddifferenttypes of cancer(includingbreastcancer,skincancer,etc.),whichwesum-marize below.