A realistic spline-based dynamic heart phantom

Author

Segars, W. Paul ; Lalush, David S. ; Tsui, Benjamin M W

Author_Institution

Dept. of Biomed. Eng., North Carolina Univ., Chapel Hill, NC, USA

Volume

46

Issue

3

fYear

1999

fDate

6/1/1999 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

503

Lastpage

506

Abstract

We develop a realistic computerized heart phantom for use in medical imaging research. This phantom is a hybrid of realistic patient-based phantoms and flexible geometry-based phantoms. The surfaces of heart structures are defined using non-uniform rational B-splines (NURBS), as used in 3D computer graphics. The NURBS primitives define continuous surfaces allowing the phantom to be defined at any resolution. Also, by fitting NURBS to patient data, the phantom is more realistic than those based on solid geometry. An important innovation is the extension of NURBS to the fourth dimension, time, to model heart motion. Points on the surfaces of heart structures were selected from a gated MRI study of a normal patient. Polygon surfaces were fit to the points for each time frame, and smoothed. 3D NURBS surfaces were fit to the smooth polygon surfaces and then a 4D NURBS surface was fit through these surfaces. Each of the principal 4D surfaces (atria, ventricles, inner and outer walls) contains approximately 200 control points. We conclude that 4D NURBS are an efficient and flexible way to describe the heart and other anatomical objects for a realistic phantom

Keywords

cardiology; computational geometry; medical image processing; motion estimation; physiological models; realistic images; rendering (computer graphics); splines (mathematics); surface fitting; 3D NURBS surface; 3D computer graphics; 4D NURBS surface; NURBS primitives; atria; continuous surfaces; flexible geometry-based phantoms; gated MRI study; heart motion; hybrid phantom; inner walls; medical imaging research; nonuniform rational B-splines; outer walls; polygon surfaces; realistic computerized heart phantom; realistic patient-based phantoms; spline-based dynamic heart phantom; ventricles; Biomedical imaging; Computer graphics; Geometry; Heart; Imaging phantoms; Solids; Spline; Surface fitting; Surface reconstruction; Surface topography;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Nuclear Science, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9499

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/23.775570

Filename

775570