Artificial neural networks for single photon emission computed tomography: A study of cold lesion detection and localization

Georgia D. Tourassi, Carey E. Floyd

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

19 Scopus citations

Abstract

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES. An artificial neural network was developed for cold lesion detection and localization in single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) images. METHODS. The network was trained for several noise levels and lesion sizes to identify lesions located in the center of small image neighborhoods. When scrolled across an image the trained network was able to identify cold abnormalities. The diagnostic performance of the technique was evaluated at two noise levels (50,000 and 100,000 counts/slice) and for two lesion sizes (radius: 1.0 cm and 1.5 cm) using the free-response operating characteristic (FROC) analysis. Furthermore, the same network was tested on a situation it was not trained on (80,000 counts/slice and a different reconstruction filter). RESULTS. The neural network showed high sensitivity and small false-positive rates per image for all test situations. These results suggest that neural networks are promising tools for computer-aided clinical diagnosis in SPECT.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)671-677
Number of pages7
JournalInvestigative Radiology
Volume28
Issue number8
DOIs
StatePublished - Aug 1993
Externally publishedYes

Funding

FundersFunder number
National Cancer InstituteR01CA046856

    Keywords

    • Artificial neural networks
    • Computer-aided diagnosis
    • Lesion detection
    • Single photon emission computed tomography

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