title: The Medical Imaging Interaction Toolkit: challenges and advances : 10 years of open-source development.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The Medical Imaging Interaction Toolkit (MITK) has been available as open-source software for almost 10 years now. In this period the requirements of software systems in the medical image processing domain have become increasingly complex. The aim of this paper is to show how MITK evolved into a software system that is able to cover all steps of a clinical workflow including data retrieval, image analysis, diagnosis, treatment planning, intervention support, and treatment control.
  
  
  METHODS
  MITK provides modularization and extensibility on different levels. In addition to the original toolkit, a module system, micro services for small, system-wide features, a service-oriented architecture based on the Open Services Gateway initiative (OSGi) standard, and an extensible and configurable application framework allow MITK to be used, extended and deployed as needed. A refined software process was implemented to deliver high-quality software, ease the fulfillment of regulatory requirements, and enable teamwork in mixed-competence teams.
  
  
  RESULTS
  MITK has been applied by a worldwide community and integrated into a variety of solutions, either at the toolkit level or as an application framework with custom extensions. The MITK Workbench has been released as a highly extensible and customizable end-user application. Optional support for tool tracking, image-guided therapy, diffusion imaging as well as various external packages (e.g. CTK, DCMTK, OpenCV, SOFA, Python) is available. MITK has also been used in several FDA/CE-certified applications, which demonstrates the high-quality software and rigorous development process.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  MITK provides a versatile platform with a high degree of modularization and interoperability and is well suited to meet the challenging tasks of today's and tomorrow's clinically motivated research.
authors.affiliation: Division of Medical and Biological Informatics (E130), German Cancer Research Center, Im Neuenheimer Feld 280, 69120 , Heidelberg, Germany. m.nolden@dkfz-heidelberg.de
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Nolden
authors.forename: Sascha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zelzer
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Seitel
authors.forename: Diana
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wald
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Müller
authors.forename: Alfred M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Franz
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Maleike
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fangerau
authors.forename: Matthias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Baumhauer
authors.forename: Lena
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Maier-Hein
authors.forename: Klaus H
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Maier-Hein
authors.forename: Hans-Peter
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Meinzer
authors.forename: Ivo
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Wolf
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003199:Computer Systems; D003952:Diagnostic Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D012984:Software; D013813:Therapy, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D014584:User-Computer Interface