Flotation bubble image segmentation based on seed region boundary growing

Segmenting blurred and conglutinated bubbles in a flotation image is done using a new segmentation method based on Seed Region and Boundary Growing（SRBG）.Bright pixels located on bubble tops were extracted as the seed regions.Seed boundaries are divided into four curves：left-top,right-top,right-bottom, and left-bottom.Bubbles are segmented from the seed boundary by moving these curves to the bubble boundaries along the corresponding directions.The SRBG method can remove noisy areas and it avoids over- and under-segmentation problems.Each bubble is segmented separately rather than segmenting the entire flotation image.The segmentation results from the SRBG method are more accurate than those from the Watershed algorithm.

Two-stage image segmentation based on edge and region information

A two-stage method for image segmentation based on edge and region information is proposed. Different deformation schemes are used at two stages for segmenting the object correctly in image plane. At the first stage, the contour of the model is divided into several segments hierarchically that deform respectively using affine transformation. After the contour is deformed to the approximate boundary of object, a fine match mechanism using statistical information of local region to redefine the external energy of the model is used to make the contour fit the object's boundary exactly. The algorithm is effective, as the hierarchical segmental deformation makes use of the globe and local information of the image, the affine transformation keeps the consistency of the model, and the reformative approaches of computing the internal energy and external energy are proposed to reduce the algorithm complexity. The adaptive method of defining the search area at the second stage makes the model converge quickly. The experimental results indicate that the proposed model is effective and robust to local minima and able to search for concave objects.

SEED REGION SELECTION AND HOMOGENEITY CRITERION FOR DOORPLATE IMAGE SEGMENTATION IN MOBILE ROBOT NAVIGATION

Focused on the seed region selection and homogeneity criterion in Seeded Region Growing (SRG), an unsupervised seed region selection and a polynomial fitting homogeneity criterion for SRG are proposed in this paper. First of all, making use of Peer Group Filtering (PGF) techniques, an unsupervised seed region selection algorithm is presented to construct a seed region. Then based on the constructed seed region a polynomial fitting homogeneity criterion is applied to solve the concrete problem of doorplate segmentation appearing in the robot navigation along a corridor. At last, experiments are performed and the results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

Image segmentation by level set evolution with region consistency constraint

Image segmentation is a key and fundamental problem in image processing,computer graphics,and computer vision.Level set based method for image segmentation is used widely for its topology flexibility and proper mathematical formulation.However,poor performance of existing level set models on noisy images and weak boundary limit its application in image segmentation.In this paper,we present a region consistency constraint term to measure the regional consistency on both sides of the boundary,this term defines the boundary of the image within a range,and hence increases the stability of the level set model.The term can make existing level set models significantly improve the efficiency of the algorithms on segmenting images with noise and weak boundary.Furthermore,this constraint term can make edge-based level set model overcome the defect of sensitivity to the initial contour.The experimental results show that our algorithm is efficient for image segmentation and outperform the existing state-of-art methods regarding images with noise and weak boundary.

A fast and efficient mesh segmentation method based on improved region growing

Mesh segmentation is one of the important issues in digital geometry processing. Region growing method has been proven to be a efficient method for 3D mesh segmentation. However, in mesh segmentation, feature line extraction algorithm is computationally costly, and the over-segmentation problem still exists during region merging processing. In order to tackle these problems, a fast and efficient mesh segmentation method based on improved region growing is proposed in this paper. Firstly, the dihedral angle of each non-boundary edge is defined and computed simply, then the sharp edges are detected and feature lines are extracted. After region growing process is finished, an improved region merging method will be performed in two steps by considering some geometric criteria. The experiment results show the feature line extraction algorithm can obtain the same geometric information fast with less computational costs and the improved region merging method can solve over-segmentation well.

An Automatic Segmentation of Kidney in Serial Abdominal CT Scans Using Region Growing Approach

Automatic kidney segmentation from abdominal CT images is a key step in computer-aided diagnosis for kidney CT as well as computeraided surgery. However, kidney segmentation from CT images is generally performed manually or semi-autornatically because of gray levels similarities of adjacent organs/tissues in abdominal CT images. This paper presents an efficient algorithm for segmenting kidney from serials of abdominal CT images. First, we extracted estimated kidney position （EKP） according to the statistical geometric location of kidney within the abdomen. Second, we analyzed the intensity distribution of EKP for several abdominal CT images and exploit an adaptive threshold searching algorithm to eliminate many other organs/tissues in the EKP. Finally, a novel region growing approach based on labeling is used to obtain the fine kidney regions. Experimental results are comparable to those of manual tracing radiologist and shown to be efficient.

A MICRO-IMAGE FUSION ALGORITHM BASED ON REGION GROWING

Due to the limitation of Depth Of Field (DOF) of microscope, the regions which are not within the DOF will be blurring after imaging. Thus for micro-image fusion, the most important step is to identify the blurring regions within each micro-image, so as to remove their undesirable impacts on the fused image. In this paper, a fusion algorithm based on a novel region growing method is proposed for micro-image fusion. The local sharpness of micro-image is judged block by block, then blocks whose sharpness is lower than an adaptive threshold are used as seeds, and the sharpness of neighbors of each seed are evaluated again during the region growing until the blurring regions are identified completely. With the decreasing in block size, the obtained region segmentation becomes more and more accurate. Finally, the micro-images are fused with pixel-wise fusion rules. The experimental results show that the proposed algorithm benefits from the novel region segmentation and it is able to obtain fused micro-image with higher sharpness compared with some popular image fusion method.

Watershed-based Image Segmentation with Region Merging and Edge Detection

The clustering technique is used to examine each pixel in the image which assigned to one of the clusters depending on the minimum distance to obtain primary classified image into different intensity regions. A watershed transformation technique is then employes. This includes: gradient of the classified image, dividing the image into markers, checking the Marker Image to see if it has zero points (watershed lines). The watershed lines are then deleted in the Marker Image created by watershed algorithm. A Region Adjacency Graph (RAG) and Region Adjacency Boundary (RAB) are created between two regions from Marker Image. Finally region merging is done according to region average intensity and two edge strengths (T1, T2). The approach of the authors is tested on remote sensing and brain MR medical images. The final segmentation result is one closed boundary per actual region in the image.

An Image Segmentation Algorithm Based on a Local Region Conditional Random Field Model

To reduce the computation cost of a combined probabilistic graphical model and a deep neural network in semantic segmentation, the local region condition random field (LRCRF) model is investigated which selectively applies the condition random field (CRF) to the most active region in the image. The full convolutional network structure is optimized with the ResNet-18 structure and dilated convolution to expand the receptive field. The tracking networks are also improved based on SiameseFC by considering the frame relations in consecutive-frame traffic scene maps. Moreover, the segmentation results of the greyscale input data sets are more stable and effective than using the RGB images for deep neural network feature extraction. The experimental results show that the proposed method takes advantage of the image features directly and achieves good real-time performance and high segmentation accuracy.

Texture feature based automated seeded region growing in abdominal MRI segmentation

A new texture feature-based seeded region growing algorithm is proposed for automated segmentation of organs in abdominal MR images. 2D Co-occurrence texture feature, Gabor texture feature, and both 2D and 3D Semi- variogram texture features are extracted from the image and a seeded region growing algorithm is run on these feature spaces. With a given Region of Interest (ROI), a seed point is automatically se-lected based on three homogeneity criteria. A threshold is then obtained by taking a lower value just before the one causing ‘explosion’. This algorithm is tested on 12 series of 3D ab-dominal MR images.

A Road Extraction Method Based on Region Growing and Mathematical Morphology from Remote Sensing Images

Road traffic is the important driving factor for economic and social development. With the rapid increase of vehicle population, road traffic problems such as traffic jam and traffic accident have become the bottleneck which restricts economic development. In recent years, natural disasters frequently occur in China. Therefore, it is essential to extract road information to compute the degree of road damage for traffic emergency management. A road extraction method based on region growing and mathematical morphology from remote sensing images is proposed in this paper. According to the road features, the remote sensing image is preprocessed to separate road regions from non-road regions preliminarily. After image thresholding, region growing algorithm is used to extract connected regions. Then we sort connected regions by area to exclude the small regions which are probably non-road objects. Finally, the mathematical morphology algorithm is used to fill the holes inside the road regions. The experimental results show that the method proposed can effectively extract roads from remote sensing images. This research also has broad prospects in dealing with traffic emergency management by the government.

Steganography Using Reversible Texture Synthesis Based on Seeded Region Growing and LSB

Steganography technology has been widely used in data transmission with secret information.However,the existing steganography has the disadvantages of low hidden information capacity,poor visual effect of cover images,and is hard to guarantee security.To solve these problems,steganography using reversible texture synthesis based on seeded region growing and LSB is proposed.Secret information is embedded in the process of synthesizing texture image from the existing natural texture.Firstly,we refine the visual effect.Abnormality of synthetic texture cannot be fully prevented if no approach of controlling visual effect is applied in the process of generating synthetic texture.We use seeded region growing algorithm to ensure texture’s similar local appearance.Secondly,the size and capacity of image can be decreased by introducing the information segmentation,because the capacity of the secret information is proportional to the size of the synthetic texture.Thirdly,enhanced security is also a contribution in this research,because our method does not need to transmit parameters for secret information extraction.LSB is used to embed these parameters in the synthetic texture.

Review of Theory and Methods of Image Segmentation

Image segmentation refers to the technique and process of partitioning a digital image into multiple segments based on image characteristics so as to extract the object of interest from it. It is a key step from image processing to image analysis. In the mid-1950s, people began to study image segmentation. For decades, various methods for image segmentation have been proposed. In this paper, traditional image segmentation methods and some new methods appearing in recent years were reviewed. Thresholding segmentation methods, region-based, edge detection-based and segmentation methods based on specific theoretical tools were introduced in detail.

Image Segmentation Using an Improved Watershed Algorithm

As watershed algorithm suffers from over-segmentation problem, this paper presented an efficient method to resolve this problem. First, pre-process of the image using median filter is made to reduce the effect of noise. Second, watershed algorithm is employed to provide initial regions. Third, regions are merged according to the information between the region and boundary. In the merger processing based on the region information, an adaptive threshold of the difference between the neighboring regions is used as the region merge criteria, which is based on the human visual character. In the merger processing on the boundary information, the gradient is used to judge the true boundary of the image to avoid merging the foreground with the background regions. Finally, post-process to the regions using mathematical morphology open and close filter is done to smooth object boundaries. The experimental results show that this method is very efficient.

EFFICIENT IMAGE SEGMENTATION FOR SEMANTIC OBJECT GENERATION

This letter presents an efficient and simple image segmentation method for semantic object spatial segmentation. First, the image is filtered using contour-preserving filters. Then it is quasi-flat labeled. The small regions near the contour are classified as uncertain regions and are eliminated by region growing and merging. Further region merging is used to reduce the region number. The simulation results show its efficiency and simplicity. It can preserve the semantic object shape while emphasize on the perceptual complex part of the object. So it conforms to the human visual perception very well.

SOFT IMAGE SEGMENTATION BASED ON CENTER-FREE FUZZY CLUSTERING

Image segmentation remains one of the major challenges in image analysis.And soft image segmentation has been widely used due to its good effect.Fuzzy clustering algorithms are very popular in soft segmentation.A new soft image segmentation method based on center-free fuzzy clustering is proposed.The center-free fuzzy clustering is the modified version of the classical fuzzy C-means ( FCM ) clustering.Different from traditional fuzzy clustering , the center-free fuzzy clustering does not need to calculate the cluster center , so it can be applied to pairwise relational data.In the proposed method , the mean-shift method is chosen for initial segmentation firstly , then the center-free clustering is used to merge regions and the final segmented images are obtained at last.Experimental results show that the proposed method is better than other image segmentation methods based on traditional clustering.

MEDICAL IMAGE SEGMENTATION BASED ON A MODIFIED LEVEL SET ALGORITHM

Objective To present a novel modified level set algorithm for medical image segmentation. Methods The algorithm is developed by substituting the speed function of level set algorithm with the region and gradient information of the image instead of the conventional gradient information. This new algorithm has been tested by a series of different modality medical images. Results We present various examples and also evaluate and compare the performance of our method with the classical level set method on weak boundaries and noisy images. Conclusion Experimental results show the proposed algorithm is effective and robust.

Unsupervised Color-texture Image Segmentation

The measure J in J value segmentation (JSEG) fails to represent the discontinuity of color, which degrades the robustness and discrimination of JSEG. An improved approach for JSEG algorithm was proposed for unsupervised color-texture image segmentation. The texture and photometric invariant edge information were combined, which results in a discriminative measure for color-texture homogeneity. Based on the image whose pixel values are values of the new measure, region growing-merging algorithm used in JSEG was then employed to segment the image. Finally, experiments on a variety of real color images demonstrate performance improvement due to the proposed method.

Texture Image Segmentation Based on Nonlinear Diffusion

A texture image segmentation based on nonlinear diffusion is presented. The scale of texture can be measured during the process of nonlinear diffusion. A smooth 5-channel vector image with edge preserved, which is composed of intensity, scale and orientation of texture image, can be achieved by coupled nonlinear diffusion. A multi-channel statistical region active contour is employed to segment this vector image. The method can be seen as a kind of unsupervised segmentation because parameters are not sensitive to different texture images. Experimental results show its high efficiency in the semiautomatic extraction of texture image.

A novel stepwise thresholding for fuzzy image segmentation

A novel stepwise thresholding method for fuzzy image segmentation is proposed. Unlike the published iterative or recursive thresholding mehtods, this method segments regions into sub-regions iteratively by increasing threshold value in a stepwise manner, based on a preset intensity homogeneity criteria. The method is particularly suited to segmentation of the laser scanning confocal microscopy (LSCM) images, computerised tomography (CT) images, magnetic resonance (MR) images, fingerprint images, etc. The method has been tested on some typical fuzzy image data sets. In this paper, the novel stepwise thresholding is first addressed. Next a new method of region labelling for region extraction is introduced. Then the design of intensity homogeneity segmentation criteria is presented. Some examples of the experiment results of fuzzy image segmentation by the method are given at the end.