Rod-like trabeculae extraction from cancellous bone microstructure using topological analysis

The study of the microstructure in cancellous bone is important in osteoporosis research. In this paper, we focus in the extraction of rod-like trabeculae in cancellous bone, whose topological and geometrical properties are known to be strongly related to bone strength. Three dimensional (3D) cancellous bone volume data obtained from micro computed tomography (micro-CT) scans is used in our analysis. Because of the complexity of the cancellous bone microstructure, the mere use of existing 3D digital topology methods is unable to yield satisfactory results for trabeculae extraction. We devise several enhancements which are specific to the identification of rod-like trabeculae. Experimental results show that the accuracy of trabeculae extraction is greatly improved. This application study may help clinicians to solve problems in future.