Three-dimensional texture analysis of MRI brain datasets

A method is proposed for three-dimensional (3-D) texture analysis of magnetic resonance imaging brain datasets. It is based on extended, multisort co-occurrence matrices that employ intensity, gradient and anisotropy image features in a uniform way. Basic properties of matrices as well as their sensitivity and dependence on spatial image scaling are evaluated. The ability of the suggested 3-D texture descriptors is demonstrated on nontrivial classification tasks for pathologic findings in brain datasets.