A Novel Four-Directional Thresholding Approach for Lung Computed-Tomography Images by Using Similarity-Based Segmentation Technique

Abstract

In automated pulmonary nodules extraction and lung disease diagnosis by image processing techniques, image segmentation is utilized as a primary and the most essential step of lung tumor analysis. But due to extensive similarity between pulmonary vessels, bronchus and arteries in lung region and the low contrast of the Computed-Tomography (CT) image the accuracy of lung tumor diagnosis is highly dependent on the precision of segmentation. Therefore, precise lung CT image segmentation has become a challenging preprocessing task for every lung disease pathological application.In this study, a novel Four-Directional Thresholding (FDT) technique is introduced. This propounded technique segments the pulmonary parenchyma in Computed-Tomography (CT) images using the Similarity-Based Segmentation (SBS). The proposed technique aims to augment the precision of the CT image thresholding by implementing an advanced thresholding approach from four different directions in which the determination of pixels' value as being either on foreground or background is highly dependent on its adjacent pixel's intensity value and the final decision is made based on all four directions' thresholding results. In this study the importance of neighbor pixels in precision of thresholding with FDT technique is demonstrated and the effectiveness of FDT method has been evaluated on different CT images. Eventually the result of segmentation using FDT method is compared by other precursors techniques, which corroborates the high exactitude of proposed technique.