ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This paper introduces a computationally inexpensive context-dependent classification of multi-echo MRI with Bayes compound decision model. In order to produce accurate region segmentation especially in homogeneous area and along boundaries of the regions, we propose a classification method that uses contextual information of local neighborhood system in the image. MATERIAL AND METHOD: The performance of the context free classifier over a statistically heterogeneous image can be improved if the local stationary regions in the image are disassociated from each other through the mechanism of the interaction parameters defined at the local neighborhood level. In order to improve the classification accuracy, we use the contextual information which resolves ambiguities in the class assignment of a pattern based on the labels of the neighboring patterns in classifying the image. Since the data immediately surrounding a given pixel is intimately associated with this given pixel, then if the true nature of the surrounding pixel is known this can be used to extract the true nature of the given pixel. The proposed context-dependent compound decision model uses the compound Bayes decision rule with the contextual information. As for the contextual information in the model, the directional transition probabilities estimated from the local neighborhood system are used for the interaction parameters. RESULTS: The context-dependent classification paradigm with compound Bayesian model for multi-echo MR images is developed. Compared to context free classification which does not consider contextual information, context-dependent classifier show improved classification results especially in homogeneous and along boundaries of regions since contextual information is used during the classification. CONCLUSION: We introduce a new paradigm to classify multi-echo MRI using clustering analysis and Bayesian compound decision model to improve the classification results.