Patent ID: 7522779

Claim:
A method of enhancing an image of an object so as to increase the visibility in the image of at least one structure within the object, wherein the image is characterized by a plurality of pixels, each pixel having an associated pixel value that represents the image intensity of a corresponding unit volume of the object, the method comprising: a) selecting at least a first neighborhood and a second neighborhood within the image, b) constructing a non-linear top-hat filter operator configured to select, within the first and second neighborhoods, one or more pixels having an optimal pixel value, and to eliminate the remaining pixels in the neighborhoods, wherein a mathematical expression for the top-hat filter operator comprises f e =f+w×[f−γ B ( f )]− b×[φ B ( f )− f], wherein f represents the image, f e represents an enhanced image resulting from the application of the top-hat filter to selected pixels within the image, w and b represent weighting coefficients, γ B (f) represents a first structural element for the opening of the image f, and φ B (f) represents a second structural element for the closing of the image f; and c) applying the non-linear top-hat filter operator to the selected neighborhoods so that only the pixels having the optimal pixel values remain in the selected neighborhoods, and the remaining pixels in the selected neighborhoods are eliminated.