GridSnake: A Grid-based implementation of the Snake segmentation algorithm

Medical imaging is becoming a key technique to visualize the internal structure of the body. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is currently used to take different spatial images of organs, such as the heart. The output of such an analysis is a set of images representing different views of the body or of an organ. There exist many algorithms to pre-process and analyze medical images such as the well known Snake segmentation algorithm. An issue in medical imaging is the large size of images, that require large and efficient data stores, and the high computational power needed to process them. For these reasons, the Grid is being more and more used as an ideal environment for medical image processing. This paper presents a first experience in porting the snake algorithm on a Globus-based Grid.