Patent ID: 11540798

Abstract:
A method for performing positron emission tomography (PET) image denoising using a dilated convolutional neural network system includes: obtaining, as an input to the dilated convolutional neural network system, a noisy image; performing image normalization to generate normalized image data corresponding to the noisy image; encoding the normalized image data using one or more convolutions in the dilated convolutional neural network, whereby a dilation rate is increased for each encoding convolution performed to generate encoded image data; decoding the encoded image data using one or more convolutions in the dilated convolutional neural network, whereby dilation rate is decreased for each decoding convolution performed to generate decoded image data; synthesizing the decoded image data to construct a denoised output image corresponding to the noisy image; and displaying the denoised output image on an image display device, the denoised output image having enhanced image quality compared to the noisy image.