A conditional random field approach for coupling local registration with robust tissue and structure segmentation

Abstract

We consider a general modelling strategy to handle in a unified way a number of tasks essential to MR brain scan analysis. Our approach is based on the explicit definition of a Conditional Random Field (CRF) model decomposed into components to be specified according to the targeted tasks. For a specific illustration, we define a CRF model that combines robust-to-noise and to nonuniformity Markovian tissue and structure segmentations with local affine atlas registration. The evaluation performed on both phantoms and real 3T images shows good results and, in particular, points out the gain in introducing registration as a model component. Besides, our modeling and estimation scheme provide general guidelines to deal with complex joint processes for medical image analysis. © 2009 Springer-Verlag.