High resolution lung airway cast segmentation with proper topology suitable for computational fluid dynamic simulations

Carson, James P.; Einstein, Daniel R.; Minard, Kevin R.; Fanucchi, Michelle V.; Wallis, Christopher D.; Corley, Richard A.

doi:10.1016/j.compmedimag.2010.03.001

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Volume 34, Issue 7 , Pages 572-578, October 2010

High resolution lung airway cast segmentation with proper topology suitable for computational fluid dynamic simulations

James P. Carson
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 902 Battelle Boulevard, P.O. Box 999, MSIN P7-58, Richland, WA 99352, United States
- Corresponding author at: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Biological Monitoring and Modeling, 902 Battelle Boulevard, P.O. Box 999, MSIN P7-58, Richland, WA 99352, United States. Tel.: +1 509 371 6894; fax: +1 509 371 6978.
Daniel R. Einstein
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 902 Battelle Boulevard, P.O. Box 999, MSIN P7-58, Richland, WA 99352, United States
Kevin R. Minard
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 902 Battelle Boulevard, P.O. Box 999, MSIN P7-58, Richland, WA 99352, United States
Michelle V. Fanucchi
- University of Alabama at Birmingham, 1530 3rd Ave S, Birmingham, AL 35294, United States
Christopher D. Wallis
- Air Quality Research Center, University of California at Davis, One Shields Avenue, Davis, CA 95616, United States
Richard A. Corley
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 902 Battelle Boulevard, P.O. Box 999, MSIN P7-58, Richland, WA 99352, United States

Received 20 February 2009; received in revised form 1 December 2009; accepted 10 March 2010. published online 12 April 2010.

Abstract

Developing detailed lung airway models is an important step towards understanding the respiratory system. While modern imaging and airway casting approaches have dramatically improved the potential detail of such models, challenges have arisen in image processing as the demand for greater detail pushes the image processing approaches to their limits. Airway segmentations with proper topology have neither loops nor invalid voxel-to-voxel connections. Here we describe a new technique for segmenting airways with proper topology and apply the approach to an image volume generated by magnetic resonance imaging of a silicone cast created from an excised monkey lung.

Keywords: Image segmentation, Airway segmentation, Computational fluid dynamics, Lung cast, Monkey, Rat, Topology, Branching, MRI