A novel Active Contour Model algorithm for contour detection in complex objects

A new Active Contour Model (ACM) algorithm for the detection of the contour of bi-dimensional regions is presented. The algorithm is based on the simulation of an elastic band glued to the contour of the region under analysis. As the concave regions included by the elastic band is defined by properly tuning a parameter A dedicated application to medical images is presented. The algorithm is part of a segmentation system able to extract the lung volume from 3D CT scans. The effectiveness of the algorithm is evaluated on a database of 15 low-dose CTscans (about 320 sectional images per CT), including 26 nodules. No pathological structure is missing after the lung volume segmentation, while a reduction of the volume to analyze is obtained to about 15% of the total volume of the original CT scan, and 25% of the chest volume.