Segmentation of the skull in 3D human MR images using mathematical morphology

Belma Dogdas; David W. Shattuck; Richard M. Leahy

doi:10.1117/12.467124

9 May 2002 Segmentation of the skull in 3D human MR images using mathematical morphology

Belma Dogdas, David W. Shattuck, Richard M. Leahy

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 4684, Medical Imaging 2002: Image Processing; (2002) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.467124
Event: Medical Imaging 2002, 2002, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

We present a new technique for segmentation of skull in human T1-weighted magnetic resonance (MR) images that generates realistic models of the head for EEG and MEG source modeling. Our method performs skull segmentation using a sequence of mathematical morphological operations. Prior to the segmentation of skull, we segment the scalp and the brain from the MR image. The scalp mask allows us to quickly exclude background voxels with intensities similar to those of the skull, while the brain mask obtained from our Brain Surface Extractor algorithm ensures that the brain does not intersect our skull segmentation. We find the inner and the outer skull boundaries using thresholding and morphological closing and opening operations. We then mask the results with the scalp and brain volumes to ensure closed and nonintersecting skull boundaries. We applied our scalp and skull segmentation algorithm to several MR images and validated our method using coregistered CT-MR image data sets. We observe that our method is capable of producing scalp and skull segmentations suitable for MEG and EEG source modeling in 3D T1-weighted human MR images.

Citation Download Citation

Belma Dogdas, David W. Shattuck, and Richard M. Leahy "Segmentation of the skull in 3D human MR images using mathematical morphology", Proc. SPIE 4684, Medical Imaging 2002: Image Processing, (9 May 2002); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.467124

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

;

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE