Alignment of Freehand 2-D Ultrasound Images for 3-D Volumetric Reconstruction
Date
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
Ultrasound is an imaging modality used in many medical procedures including the diagnosis of diseases in Neonates. We aim to develop a Computer simulation using 3-D ultrasound to teach clinicians how to perform Neonatal head Ultrasound. To achieve this, we need to align a series of 2-D ultrasound data to reconstruct the 3-D volume. The source data was acquired by freehand movement of the ultrasound probe which results in misalignment and incorrect spacing/angle of the 3-D data. Previous techniques used to solve this problem rely on speckles in the ultrasound images. We devised an algorithm to automatically correct the misalignment using 2-D registration and estimate the elevational spacing/angle by optimizing a cost function against a perpendicular reference Image. After running the algorithm on the dataset, we observed significant improvement in the alignment and 3-D structure. This algorithm will facilitate generating 3-D volume data needed to develop a high quality Simulator.