title: Anatomical annotation on vascular structure in volume rendered images.
abstract: The precise annotation of vascular structure is desired in computer-assisted systems to help surgeons identify each vessel branch. This paper proposes a method that annotates vessels on volume rendered images by rendering their names on them using a two-pass rendering process. In the first rendering pass, vessel surface models are generated using such properties as centerlines, radii, and running directions. Then the vessel names are drawn on the vessel surfaces. Finally, the vessel name images and the corresponding depth buffer are generated by a virtual camera at the viewpoint. In the second rendering pass, volume rendered images are generated by a ray casting volume rendering algorithm that considers the depth buffer generated in the first rendering pass. After the two-pass rendering is finished, an annotated image is generated by blending the volume rendered image with the surface rendered image. To confirm the effectiveness of our proposed method, we performed a computer-assisted system for the automated annotation of abdominal arteries. The experimental results show that vessel names can be drawn on the corresponding vessel surface in the volume rendered images at a computing cost that is nearly the same as that by volume rendering only. The proposed method has enormous potential to be adopted to annotate the vessels in the 3D medical images in clinical applications, such as image-guided surgery.
authors.affiliation: Graduate School of Information Science, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan.
authors.forename: Zhengang
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.forename: Yukitaka
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Nimura
authors.forename: Yuichiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Hayashi
authors.forename: Takayuki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kitasaka
authors.forename: Kazunari
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Misawa
authors.forename: Michitaka
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fujiwara
authors.forename: Yasukazu
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kajita
authors.forename: Toshihiko
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Wakabayashi
authors.forename: Kensaku
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Mori
mesh_terms: D000792:Angiography / Q000379:methods*; D001185:Artificial Intelligence; D001808:Blood Vessels / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D004282:Documentation / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional / Q000379:methods*; D009323:Natural Language Processing; D010363:Pattern Recognition, Automated / Q000379:methods*; D009626:Terminology as Topic