A Sequential 3D Thinning Algorithm and Its Medical Applications

Skeleton is a frequently applied shape feature to represent the general form of an object. Thinning is an iterative object reduction technique for producing a reasonable approximation to the skeleton in a topology preserving way. This paper describes a sequential 3D thinning algorithm for extracting medial lines of objects in (26, 6) pictures. Our algorithm has been successfully applied in medical image analysis. Three of the emerged applications (analysing airways, blood vessels, and colons) are also presented. 1 Basic Notions and Results Let p be a point in the 3D digital space ZZ3 . Let us denote Nj(p) (for j = 6, 18, 26) the set of points j?adjacent to point p (see Fig. 1/a). The sequence of distinct points x0, x1, . . . , xn is a j?path of length n 0 from point x0 to point xn in a non?empty set of points X if each point of the sequence is in X and xi is j?adjacent to xi-1 for each 1 i n. (Note that a single point is a j?path of length 0.) Two points are j?connected in the set X...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2001
• Where: IPMI
• Authors: Kálmán Palágyi, Erich Sorantin, Emese Balogh, Attila Kuba, Csongor Halmai, Balázs Erdöhelyi, Klaus Hausegger
• Keywords: Black Point, Border Point, IPMI 2001, Medical Imaging, White Point