title: Detection and measurement of retinal vessels in fundus images using amplitude modified second-order Gaussian filter.
abstract: In this paper, the fitness of estimating vessel profiles with Gaussian function is evaluated and an amplitude-modified second-order Gaussian filter is proposed for the detection and measurement of vessels. Mathematical analysis is given and supported by a simulation and experiments to demonstrate that the vessel width can be measured in linear relationship with the "spreading factor" of the matched filter when the magnitude coefficient of the filter is suitably assigned. The absolute value of vessel diameter can be determined simply by using a precalibrated line, which is typically required since images are always system dependent. The experiment shows that the inclusion of the width measurement in the detection process can improve the performance of matched filter and result in a significant increase in success rate of detection.
authors.affiliation: School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
authors.forename: Luo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gang
authors.forename: Opas
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Chutatape
authors.forename: Shankar M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Krishnan
mesh_terms: D003198:Computer Simulation; D005451:Fluorescein Angiography / Q000379:methods*; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D008955:Models, Cardiovascular; D016011:Normal Distribution; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012171:Retinal Vessels / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted