Color thinning with applications to biomedical images

Abstract

A scheme for cell extraction in color histological images based edge detection and thinning is considered. An algorithm for thinning of color images is proposed that is based on thinning of pseudo gray-scale image. To extract accurately gray-scale levels, we propose a new coordinate system for color representation: system PHS, where P is a vector of color distance, H is a hue (chromaticity), S is a relative saturation. This coordinate system allows one to take into account specifics of histological images. Comparison of image thinning in other coordinate color systems is given that shows the image thinning in PHS system produces a rather high-quality skeleton of the objects in a color image. The proposed algorithm was tested on the histological images.