Developments towards frame-to-frame computer processing of coronary angiograms

A coronary cine-angiogram is a sequence of roentgen absorption images of the coronary arterial system, where each frame represents the projection of the arterial tree on a two-dimensional plane at a specific instant of the cardiac cycle. In single frames, the automated delineation of the projected arteries of the entire coronary tree can be achieved by means of a maximum brightness tracing procedure, followed by minimum cost contour detection. A method has been developed to guide the segmentation process in a specific frame by utilizing the a priori knowledge gathered from the previous frame. This a priori knowledge is represented in terms of a structural model of the arterial system, which is based on the tangent angle function of the various branches. As a result of this guidance user interaction may be reduced to a minimum.

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