A directional small-scale tissue model for an anthropomorphic breast phantom

Abstract

Mammographic tissue structure has been shown to exhibit directionality, with a preferred orientation towards the nipple. However, this property is absent in the small-scale tissue model of current breast phantoms. To improve existing breast phantoms, a model for simulating oriented breast tissue has been developed, and has been included into an existing anthropomorphic breast phantom. Within this model, directionality was introduced by filling compartments with binarized power-law noise that was oriented towards the nipple. Mammograms were simulated based on the original and the new directional phantom. Tissue orientation was measured in the simulated mammogram. Visually, the appearance of the enhanced phantom was more realistic. Further, the distribution of the orientation measure computed from the enhanced phantom was more similar to that in actual mammograms. In conclusion, the use of a directional model to simulate fibroglandular tissue greatly improves the realism of the breast phantom. © 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.