Endomicroscopic image retrieval and classification using invariant visual features

This paper investigates the use of modern content based image retrieval methods to classify endomicroscopic images into two categories: neoplastic (pathological) and benign. We describe first the method that maps an image into a visual feature signature which is a numerical vector invariant with respect to some particular classes of geometric and intensity transformations. Then we explain how these signatures are used to retrieve from a database the k closest images to a new image. The classification is finally achieved through a procedure of votes weighted by a proximity criterion (weighted k-nearest neighbors). Compared with several previously published alternatives whose maximal accuracy rate is almost 67% on the database, our approach yields an accuracy of 80% and offers promising perspectives.