buggle's watchlist [at least 200 articles]

Abstract

This paper provides a comprehensive and quantitative review of spatial transformations models for nonrigid image registration. It explains the theoretical foundation of the models and classifies them according to this basis. This results in two categories, physically based models described by partial differential equations of continuum mechanics (e.g., linear elasticity and fluid flow) and basis function expansions derived from interpolation and approximation theory (e.g., radial basis functions, B-splines and wavelets). Recent work on constraining the transformation so that it preserves the ...

Abstract

The authors consider elastic image registration based on a set of corresponding anatomical point landmarks and approximating thin-plate splines. This approach is an extension of the original interpolating thin-plate spline approach and allows to take into account landmark localization errors. The extension is important for clinical applications since landmark extraction is always prone to error. The authors' approach is based on a minimizing functional and can cope with isotropic as well as anisotropic landmark errors. In particular, in the latter case ...

Abstract

Motivated group members experience a full sense of choice: of doing what one wants. Such behavior shows high performance, is enjoyable, and enhances innovation. This essay describes principles of building a motivated research group. ...

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Abstract Summary  The incidence of hip fractures in Denmark declined by about 20% from 1997 to 2006 in both men and women aged 60 and over. The decrease in hip fracture rates was much too large to be explained by the extent of anti-osteoporotic medication used in the country. Introduction  The purpose of this study is to clarify (1) if hip fracture rates decline in Denmark despite low treatment rates and (2) if changes in age-specific rates could be explained by anti-osteoporotic medications. ...

Abstract

The Active Appearance Model (AAM) is a powerful generative method for modeling and registering deformable visual objects. Most methods for AAM fitting utilize a linear parameter update model in an iterative framework. Despite its popularity, the scope of this approach is severely restricted, both in fitting accuracy and capture range, due to the simplicity of the linear update models used. In this paper, we present an new AAM fitting formulation, which utilizes a nonlinear update model. To motivate our approach, we ...

Abstract

This paper investigates the use of a total least squares approach in a generalization of the iterative closest point (ICP) algorithm for shape registration. A new Generalized Total Least Squares (GTLS) formulation of the minimization process is presented opposed to the traditional Least Squares (LS) technique. Accounting for uncertainty both in the target and in the source models will lead to a more robust estimation of the transformation. Robustness against outliers is guaranteed by an iterative scheme to update the noise ...

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze the activity of single fibers in the optic nerve of a frog. Our method is to find what sort of stimulus causes the largest activity in one nerve fiber and then what is the exciting aspect of that stimulus such that variations in everything else cause little change in the response. It has been known for the past 20 years that each fiber is connected not to a few rods and cones in the retina but ...

Abstract

We propose a framework to learn statistical shape models for faces as piecewise linear models. Specifically, our methodology builds upon primitive active shape models(ASM) to handle large scale variation in shapes and appearances of faces. Non-linearities in shape manifold arising due to large head rotation cannot be accurately modeled using ASM. Moreover overly general image descriptor causes the cost function to have multiple local minima which in turn degrades the quality of shape registration. We propose to use multiple overlapping subspaces ...

Abstract

An object recognition system has been developed that uses a new class of local image features. The features are invariant to image scaling, translation, and rotation, and partially invariant to illumination changes and affine or 3D projection.These features share similar properties with neurons in inferior temporal cortex that are used for object recognition in primate vision. Features are efficiently detected through a staged filtering approach that identifies stable points in scale space. Image keys are created that allow for local geometric ...

Abstract

During the past decade there has been an explosion in computation and information technology. With it has come vast amounts of data in a variety of fields such as medicine, biology, finance, and marketing. The challenge of understanding these data has led to the development of new tools in the field of statistics, and spawned new areas such as data mining, machine learning, and bioinformatics. Many of these tools have common underpinnings but are often expressed with different terminology. This book describes the important ideas in these areas in ...

Abstract

We propose an approach to accurately detecting two-dimensional (2-D) shapes. The cross section of the shape boundary is modeled as a step function. We first derive a one-dimensional (1-D) optimal step edge operator, which minimizes both the noise power and the mean squared error between the input and the filter output. This operator is found to be the derivative of the double exponential (DODE) function, originally derived by Ben-Arie and Rao (1994). We define an operator for shape detection by extending ...

Abstract

Nonlinear registration is mostly performed after initialization by a global, linear transformation (in this work, we focus on similarity transformations), computed by a linear registration method. For the further processing of the results, it is mostly assumed that this preregistration step completely removes the respective linear transformation. However, we show that in deformable settings, this is not the case. As a consequence, a significant linear component is still existent in the deformation computed by the nonlinear registration algorithm. For construction of ...

Abstract

We propose a shape-based approach to curve evolution for the segmentation of medical images containing known object types. In particular, motivated by the work of Leventon, Grimson, and Faugeras, we derive a parametric model for an implicit representation of the segmenting curve by applying principal component analysis to a collection of signed distance representations of the training data. The parameters of this representation are then manipulated to minimize an objective function for segmentation. The resulting algorithm is able to handle multidimensional ...

Abstract

INTRODUCTION:The objective was to determine if structural bone parameters obtained from dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) contribute to the prediction of progression of hip osteoarthritis (OA) and to test if the difference between the most affected (OA) hip and the contralateral hip adds to this prediction.METHODS:The study group involves a prospective cohort of 189 patients that met the ACR classification criteria for hip osteoarthritis. Progression was defined as 20% joint space narrowing or total hip replacement within a two years follow ...

Abstract

The introduction of new devices demands the assessment of their capabilities in established terms. The accuracy, reproducibility and spatial resolution of in vitro (phantom) osteodensitometric and morphometric measurements of QDR 2000 Plus and EXPERT are presented. Design details of these DXA/MXA-devices are listed and discussed in combination with the data acquired in the test measurements and calculations. The image quality will improve with further software developments. The long-term reproducibility and in vivo reliability remains to be evaluated. ...

Abstract

Dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) is one of the most widely used techniques in the management of osteoporosis and other skeletal diseases. Although patient doses from DXA are generally low, it is still necessary to measure them to assess the risk of radiation injury. We report on a study to estimate the effective dose (ED) to patients and staff from a new DXA scanner--the Lunar EXPERT, and make a comparison with a similar study carried out on a Lunar DPX-L. The ...

Abstract

Osteoporosis is a prevalent condition in Norway, as evidenced by the fact that this country has the highest reported incidences of hip and distal forearm fractures. Because recent studies suggest a higher bone density in rural populations compared with urban ones, increased physical activity is believed to be an important factor in reducing fracture incidence. In the present investigation, 185 femoral necks from the Schreiner Collection in Oslo were measured by means of a bone-mass scanner. The bones, anthropological specimens ranging ...

Abstract

The uniquely designed limbs of the African elephant, Loxodonta africana, support the weight of the largest terrestrial animal. Besides other morphological peculiarities, the feet are equipped with large subcutaneous cushions which play an important role in distributing forces during weight bearing and in storing or absorbing mechanical forces. Although the cushions have been discussed in the literature and captive elephants, in particular, are frequently affected by foot disorders, precise morphological data are sparse. The cushions in the feet of African elephants ...

Abstract

Elephant limbs display unique morphological features which are related mainly to supporting the enormous body weight of the animal. In elephants, the knee joint plays important roles in weight bearing and locomotion, but anatomical data are sparse and lacking in functional analyses. In addition, the knee joint is affected frequently by arthrosis. Here we examined structures of the knee joint by means of standard anatomical techniques in eight African (Loxodonta africana) and three Asian elephants (Elephas maximus). Furthermore, we performed radiography ...

Abstract

As we move through the world, our eyes acquire a sequence of images. The information from this sequence is sufficient to determine the structure of a three-dimensional scene, up to a scale factor determined by the distance that the eyes have moved. Previous evidence shows that the human visual system accounts for the distance the observer has walked and the separation of the eyes when judging the scale, shape, and distance of objects. However, in an immersive virtual-reality environment, observers failed ...

Abstract

We present a novel approach to measuring similarity between shapes and exploit it for object recognition. In our framework, the measurement of similarity is preceded by: (1) solving for correspondences between points on the two shapes; (2) using the correspondences to estimate an aligning transform. In order to solve the correspondence problem, we attach a descriptor, the shape context, to each point. The shape context at a reference point captures the distribution of the remaining points relative to it, thus offering ...

Abstract

Abstract  Since their introduction as a means of front propagation and their first application to edge-based segmentation in the early 90’s, level set methods have become increasingly popular as a general framework for image segmentation. In this paper, we present a survey of a specific class of region-based level set segmentation methods and clarify how they can all be derived from a common statistical framework. Region-based segmentation schemes aim at partitioning the image domain by progressively fitting statistical models to the intensity, ...

Abstract

The authors describe a general-purpose, representation-independent method for the accurate and computationally efficient registration of 3-D shapes including free-form curves and surfaces. The method handles the full six degrees of freedom and is based on the iterative closest point (ICP) algorithm, which requires only a procedure to find the closest point on a geometric entity to a given point. The ICP algorithm always converges monotonically to the nearest local minimum of a mean-square distance metric, and the rate of convergence is ...

Abstract

The morphology of the proximal ulna has been shown to effectively differentiate archaic or premodern humans (such as Homo heidelbergensis and H. neanderthalensis) from modern humans (H. sapiens). Accordingly, the morphology of adjacent, articulating elements should be able to distinguish these two broad groups as well. Here we test the taxonomic utility of another portion of the elbow, the distal humerus, as a discriminator of archaic and modern humans. Principal components analysis was employed on a suite of log-raw and log-shape ...

Abstract

Cytochrome P450 oxidoreductase (POR) is the obligate electron donor for all microsomal cytochrome P450 enzymes, which catalyze the metabolism of a wide spectrum of xenobiotic and endobiotic compounds. Point mutations in POR have been found recently in patients with Antley-Bixler-like syndrome, which includes limb skeletal defects. In order to study P450 function during limb and skeletal development, we deleted POR specifically in mouse limb bud mesenchyme. Forelimbs and hind limbs in conditional knockout (CKO) mice were short with thin skeletal elements ...

Abstract

The shapes of cervical (C12013C7) and upper thoracic (T1, T2) vertebrae from the rat and the grey-headed flying fox have been analysed by Fourier analysis to investigate the types of variation present and to try to isolate bones according to position along the vertebral column and species. It was found that the T2 vertebrae of the rat are very different from all others in the study, that C2 and C6 vertebrae are very similar and that the remaining vertebrae split according ...

Abstract

In the evolution of flight bats appear to have suffered a trade-off; they have become poor crawlers relative to terrestrial mammals. Capable walking does occur in a few disparate taxa, including the vampire bats, but the vast majority of bats are able only to shuffle awkwardly along the ground, and the morphological bases of differences in crawling ability are not currently understood. One widely cited hypothesis suggests that the femora of most bats are too weak to withstand the compressive forces ...

Abstract

Reduced skeletal loading typically leads to bone loss because bone formation and bone resorption become unbalanced. Hibernation is a natural model of musculoskeletal disuse because hibernating animals greatly reduce weight-bearing activity, and therefore, they would be expected to lose bone. Some evidence suggests that small mammals like ground squirrels, bats, and hamsters do lose bone during hibernation, but the mechanism of bone loss is unclear. In contrast, hibernating bears maintain balanced bone remodeling and preserve bone structure and strength. Differences in ...

Abstract

doi: 10.1086/285723 ...

Abstract

A nonparametric and unsupervised method of automatic threshold selection for picture segmentation is presented. An optimal threshold is selected by the discriminant criterion, namely, so as to maximize the separability of the resultant classes in gray levels. The procedure is very simple, utilizing only the zeroth- and the first-order cumulative moments of the gray-level histogram. It is straightforward to extend the method to multithreshold problems. Several experimental results are also presented to support the validity of the method. ...

Abstract

To determine the associations between serum levels of vitamin D, sunlight exposure, and knee cartilage loss cross-sectionally and longitudinally in older adults.A total of 880 randomly selected subjects (mean age 61 years [range 51-79 years], 50% women) were studied at baseline, and 353 of these subjects were studied 2.9 years later. Serum levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25[OH]D) were assessed by radioimmunoassay, and sunlight exposure was assessed by questionnaire. T1-weighted fat-suppressed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the right knee was performed to ...

Abstract

Osteocytes are the most numerous cells in bone, embedded within the mineralized bone matrix. Their slender cytoplasmic processes form a complex intercellular network. In addition, these processes are thought to be important structures in the response to mechanical stress. This study provides an extensive analysis of the three-dimensional structure of the osteocyte and its processes in 16-day-old embryonic chick calvariae, based on nondestructive subsurface histotomography using both confocal laser scanning (CLS) microscopy and differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy. OB7.3, a chicken ...

Abstract

Osteocytes are surrounded by hard bone matrix. Therefore, it has not previously been possible to demonstrate the real architecture of the osteocyte network in bone. We previously reported that it is possible to observe osteocytes in bone by labeling the cells with fluorescence and using confocal laser scanning (CLS) microscopy. In this study, we for the first time conducted an extensive analysis of the morphology and morphometry of the three-dimensional (3D) osteocyte structure using three-dimensionally reconstructed fluorescent images. Sixteen-day-old embryonic chick ...

Abstract

Our objective was to estimate the relationship between longitudinal change in BMD and fragility fractures. We studied 3635 women and 1417 men 50–85 yr of age in the Canadian Multicentre Osteoporosis Study who had at least two BMD measurements (lumbar spine, femoral neck, total hip, and trochanter) within the first 5 yr of the study and fragility fractures (any, main, forearm/wrist, ribs, hip) within the first 7 yr. Multiple logistic regression was used to model the relationship between baseline BMD, BMD ...

Abstract

In vitro assays to measure neuronal growth are a fundamental tool used by many neurobiologists studying neuronal development and regeneration. The quantification of these assays requires accurate measurements of neurite length and neuronal cell numbers in neuronal cultures. Generally, these measurements are obtained through labor-intensive manual or semi-manual tracing of images. To automate these measurements, we have written NeuriteTracer, a neurite tracing plugin for the freely available image-processing program ImageJ. The plugin analyzes fluorescence microscopy images of neurites and nuclei of ...

Abstract

SUMMARY This paper is a review of the use of contextual information in statistical image analysis. After defining what we mean by 'context', we describe the Bayesian approach to high-level image analysis using deformable templates. We describe important aspects of work on character recognition and syntactic pattern recognition; in particular, aspects of the work which are relevant to scene understanding. We conclude with a review of some work on knowledge-based systems which use context to aid object recognition. ...

Abstract

Abstract Summary  Using Portuguese hospital registers (2000–2002) we calculated age-standardized incidence rates of hip fractures. Spatial clusters of high incidence rates were found, with annual averages (per 100,000 inhabitants) varying from 154.4 to 572.2 and 77.3 to 231.5 for women and men, respectively. Geographic inequalities in the occurrence of hip fractures were also found. Introduction  The aim of this study was to identify spatial patterns in the incidence of hip fracture in Portugal during the period 2000 to 2002. Methods  From the National Hospital ...

Abstract

To determine whether 2-dimensional measures of femoral head shape and angle are associated with hip osteoarthritis (OA).We compared cases with symptomatic radiographic hip OA with asymptomatic controls with no radiographic hip OA. On anteroposterior pelvis radiographs, we measured ldquopistol grip deformityrdquo for each hip (visually categorized as nonspherical, indeterminate, or spherical), the femoral head-to-femoral neck ratio as an interval measure of femoral head shape, and the femoral neck shaft angle. The relative risk of hip OA associated with each feature was ...