Vessel Visualization using Curved Surface Reformation

Thomas Auzinger, Gabriel Mistelbauer, Ivan Baclija, Rüdiger Schernthaner, Arnold Köchl, Michael Wimmer, Meister Eduard Gröller, Stefan Bruckner
Vessel Visualization using Curved Surface Reformation
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (Proceedings of IEEE Scientific Visualization 2013), 19(12):2858-2867, December 2013. [Paper]

Information

Abstract

Visualizations of vascular structures are frequently used in radiological investigations to detect and analyze vascular diseases. Obstructions of the blood flow through a vessel are one of the main interests of physicians, and several methods have been proposed to aid the visual assessment of calcifications on vessel walls. Curved Planar Reformation (CPR) is a wide-spread method that is designed for peripheral arteries which exhibit one dominant direction. To analyze the lumen of arbitrarily oriented vessels, Centerline Reformation (CR) has been proposed. Both methods project the vascular structures into 2D image space in order to reconstruct the vessel lumen. In this paper, we propose Curved Surface Reformation (CSR), a technique that computes the vessel lumen fully in 3D. This offers high-quality interactive visualizations of vessel lumina and does not suffer from problems of earlier methods such as ambiguous visibility cues or premature discretization of centerline data. Our method maintains exact visibility information until the final query of the 3D lumina data. We also present feedback from several domain experts.

Additional Files and Images

Additional images and videos

Cost function: Visualization of our cost function for a synthetic trefoil knot vessel. For a viewer located above the know, the value of the cost function on the cut surface is depicted by the depth. Cost function: Visualization of our cost function for a synthetic trefoil knot vessel. For a viewer located above the know, the value of the cost function on the cut surface is depicted by the depth.
demo-video_high-quality: CSR applied to various medical data sets (high quality - 74 MB - DivX codec). demo-video_high-quality: CSR applied to various medical data sets (high quality - 74 MB - DivX codec).
demo-video: CSR applied to various medical data sets (low quality - 19 MB - DivX codec). demo-video: CSR applied to various medical data sets (low quality - 19 MB - DivX codec).
Result image: CSR applied to a medical volume data set of the bifurcation of the human abdominal aorta. Result image: CSR applied to a medical volume data set of the bifurcation of the human abdominal aorta.
Image
Image

Additional files

Paper: Full paper preprint. Paper: Full paper preprint.
Questionnaire: The questionnaire, which was used for our evaluation. Questionnaire: The questionnaire, which was used for our evaluation.
Teaser image: The teaser image shows an application of our method to a medical volume data set of the bifurcation of the human abdominal aorta. A 3D direct volume rendering with the surface of the vessel tree is shown on the left. The right three images depict CSR for different view directions. Teaser image: The teaser image shows an application of our method to a medical volume data set of the bifurcation of the human abdominal aorta. A 3D direct volume rendering with the surface of the vessel tree is shown on the left. The right three images depict CSR for different view directions.

Weblinks

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BibTeX

@article{Auzinger_Mistelbauer_2013_CSR,
  title =      "Vessel Visualization using Curved Surface Reformation",
  author =     "Thomas Auzinger and Gabriel Mistelbauer and Ivan Baclija and
               R\"{u}diger Schernthaner and Arnold K\"{o}chl and Michael
               Wimmer and Meister Eduard Gr\"{o}ller and Stefan Bruckner",
  year =       "2013",
  abstract =   "Visualizations of vascular structures are frequently used in
               radiological investigations to detect and analyze vascular
               diseases. Obstructions of the blood flow through a vessel
               are one of the main interests of physicians, and several
               methods have been proposed to aid the visual assessment of
               calcifications on vessel walls. Curved Planar Reformation
               (CPR) is a wide-spread method that is designed for
               peripheral arteries which exhibit one dominant direction. To
               analyze the lumen of arbitrarily oriented vessels,
               Centerline Reformation (CR) has been proposed. Both methods
               project the vascular structures into 2D image space in order
               to reconstruct the vessel lumen. In this paper, we propose
               Curved Surface Reformation (CSR), a technique that computes
               the vessel lumen fully in 3D. This offers high-quality
               interactive visualizations of vessel lumina and does not
               suffer from problems of earlier methods such as ambiguous
               visibility cues or premature discretization of centerline
               data. Our method maintains exact visibility information
               until the final query of the 3D lumina data. We also present
               feedback from several domain experts.",
  month =      dec,
  journal =    "IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics
               (Proceedings of IEEE Scientific Visualization 2013)",
  number =     "12",
  volume =     "19",
  pages =      "2858--2867",
  keywords =   "Surface Approximation, Vessel, Reformation, Volume Rendering",
  URL =        "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2013/Auzinger_Mistelbauer_2013_CSR/",
}