Virtual Tissue Rotation in Mammography Tomosynthesis
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current mammography imaging methods face challenges in accurately displaying tissue changes due to similar X-ray attenuation coefficients of cancerous and healthy tissues, leading to incomplete data and poor quantum statistics, which results in false diagnoses and suboptimal visualization of soft-tissue data.
Innovation Solution
An imaging method that generates projection recordings of a tissue region, creates slice images, and rotates a slice image portion corresponding to a partial tissue region, allowing for enhanced visualization of tissue changes by simulating the X-ray beam's path through a longer path, thereby increasing contrast and clarity, using techniques like Siddon's method or ray-casting for projection generation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If conventional mammography imaging methods are used, then the imaging process is simple and fast, but the contrast between cancerous and healthy tissues is poor due to similar X-ray attenuation coefficients
Solution Approach 1:
The patent transitions from conventional 2D mammography to 3D tomosynthesis by introducing a temporal and spatial dimension. Multiple projections are acquired from different angles and reconstructed into volumetric data, allowing tissue visualization from multiple perspectives. This dimensional enhancement improves tissue contrast detection by separating overlapping structures and enabling rotation of slice images to view tissue changes from optimal angles.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent divides the breast tissue volume into multiple thin slice images along the compression direction. Each slice represents a specific depth plane, allowing radiologists to examine individual tissue layers separately. This segmentation eliminates the superposition of structures from different depths, significantly improving the contrast and detectability of tissue changes that would be obscured in conventional 2D imaging.
2Loss of information
If the X-ray source is pivoted over multiple steps to generate multiple projections, then three-dimensional image information is obtained, but the scanning time and complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent acquires projections over a limited angular range (typically ±15 to ±25 degrees from the central ray) rather than a full 360-degree scan. This partial scanning approach provides sufficient 3D information for clinical diagnosis while significantly reducing scanning time and radiation dose. The reconstruction algorithms are optimized to generate high-quality volumetric images from this limited angular data, achieving the necessary tissue density information without excessive scanning.
3Measurement precision
If slice images are rotated to view tissue from different perspectives, then tissue change visualization is improved, but computational complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent creates virtual copies of the physical imaging system through computational modeling. Once the 3D volume is reconstructed from the acquired projections, the system can generate infinite virtual projections by mathematically rotating and reprojecting the volumetric data. This copying approach allows radiologists to view tissue from any desired angle without requiring additional physical scans, significantly improving tissue change visualization while avoiding the complexity of multiple physical scanning setups.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This method improves the display of tissue changes with higher contrast and detail, reducing false diagnoses by allowing radiologists to analyze tissue from different perspectives, achieving comparable information to full-field digital mammography while minimizing artifacts and enhancing signal-to-noise ratios.
Implementation Method 1
An X-ray apparatus with an X-ray beam source and a detector is used to generate a first two-dimensional image or a first projection of the tissue to be examined, through which tissue the X-ray beam passes
Implementation Method 2
In a tomosynthesis method, a three-dimensional image is generated from a plurality of two-dimensional projections
Data Source
AI summary
An imaging method, more particularly a mammography method, includes rotating a tissue region in the virtual domain. Projection recordings of a tissue region are generated by way of radiation emitted by an emitter, which radiation is captured by a detector after passing through the tissue region. Slice images are generated from the projection recordings. A slice image region corresponding to a partial tissue region is rotated virtually. The virtually rotating partial tissue region can be displayed as a set of virtual projections.