TY - JOUR
T1 - Rapid semi-automatic segmentation of the spinal cord from magnetic resonance images
T2 - Application in multiple sclerosis
AU - Horsfield, Mark A.
AU - Sala, Stefania
AU - Neema, Mohit
AU - Absinta, Martina
AU - Bakshi, Anshika
AU - Sormani, Maria Pia
AU - Rocca, Maria A.
AU - Bakshi, Rohit
AU - Filippi, Massimo
N1 - Funding Information:
Dr. Bakshi acknowledges support of this project by research grants from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society (RG3705A1 and RG3798A2) and National Institutes of Health (1R01NS055083-01).
PY - 2010
Y1 - 2010
N2 - A new semi-automatic method for segmenting the spinal cord from MR images is presented. The method is based on an active surface (AS) model of the cord surface, with intrinsic smoothness constraints. The model is initialized by the user marking the approximate cord center-line on a few representative slices, and the compact surface parametrization results in a rapid segmentation, taking on the order of 1 min. Using 3-D acquired T1-weighted images of the cervical spine from human controls and patients with multiple sclerosis, the intra- and inter-observer reproducibilities were evaluated, and compared favorably with an existing cord segmentation method. While the AS method overestimated the cord area by approximately 14% compared to manual outlining, correlations between cord cross-sectional area and clinical disability scores confirmed the relevance of the new method in measuring cord atrophy in multiple sclerosis. Segmentation of the cord from 2-D multi-slice T2-weighted images is also demonstrated over the cervical and thoracic region. Since the cord center-line is an intrinsic parameter extracted as part of the segmentation process, the image can be resampled such that the center-line forms one coordinate axis of a new image, allowing simple visualization of the cord structure and pathology; this could find wider application in standard radiological practice.
AB - A new semi-automatic method for segmenting the spinal cord from MR images is presented. The method is based on an active surface (AS) model of the cord surface, with intrinsic smoothness constraints. The model is initialized by the user marking the approximate cord center-line on a few representative slices, and the compact surface parametrization results in a rapid segmentation, taking on the order of 1 min. Using 3-D acquired T1-weighted images of the cervical spine from human controls and patients with multiple sclerosis, the intra- and inter-observer reproducibilities were evaluated, and compared favorably with an existing cord segmentation method. While the AS method overestimated the cord area by approximately 14% compared to manual outlining, correlations between cord cross-sectional area and clinical disability scores confirmed the relevance of the new method in measuring cord atrophy in multiple sclerosis. Segmentation of the cord from 2-D multi-slice T2-weighted images is also demonstrated over the cervical and thoracic region. Since the cord center-line is an intrinsic parameter extracted as part of the segmentation process, the image can be resampled such that the center-line forms one coordinate axis of a new image, allowing simple visualization of the cord structure and pathology; this could find wider application in standard radiological practice.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.12.121
DO - 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2009.12.121
M3 - Article
C2 - 20060481
AN - SCOPUS:77952294568
SN - 1053-8119
VL - 50
SP - 446
EP - 455
JO - NeuroImage
JF - NeuroImage
IS - 2
ER -