Patent ID: 8055047
Filing Date: 2011-11-08
Classification: G06K

Abstract:
1. A method for automatic recognition of one or more surface features in 3-D volumetric image data, the method comprising: obtaining 3-D volumetric image data from a computed tomography apparatus; extracting a triangulated mesh surface representation from said 3-D volumetric image data, wherein each vertex p constructing an initial shape operator at each vertex of said triangulated mesh; smoothing said initial shape operator according to an iterative weighted averaging of shape operators at vertices of said triangulated mesh to provide a smoothed shape operator; calculating principal curvatures k selecting one or two feature types of interest from the group consisting of local minimum of surface elevation and local maximum of surface elevation; marking each vertex having principal curvatures consistent with said selected feature types according to feature type; clustering vertices marked as having the same feature type by adjacency on said triangulated mesh to provide a set of candidate patches; computing a feature score for each of said candidate patches; providing said feature scores as output.