Cylindrical Echocardiographic Image Segmentation Based on 3D Deformable Models

This paper presents a 3D echocardiographic image segmen-tation procedure based on deformable surfaces. We rst propose to adapt ltering techniques to the cylindrical geometry of several 3D ultrasound image devices. Then we compare the eeect of diierent external forces on a surface template deformation inside volumetric echocardiographic images. An original method involving region grey-level analysis along the model normal directions is described. We rely on an a priori knowledge of the cardiac left ventricle shape and on region grey-level values to perform a robust segmentation. During the deformation process the allowable surface deformation is modiied. Finally, we show experimental results on very challenging sparse and noisy images and quantitative measurements of the left ventricle volume.