Patent ID: 8494243

Claim:
A computer implemented method for performing deformable non-rigid registration of 2D and 3D images of a vascular structure for assistance in surgical intervention, comprising: acquiring pre-operative 3D image data including the vascular structure; representing the vascular structure as a graph in which each point of bifurcation of the vascular structure is represented as a node and each vessel segment extended between points of bifurcation of the vascular structure is represented as an edge, based on the 3D image data; performing graph-based segmentation on the graph to identify a structure of interest; acquiring intra-operative 2D X-ray image data including the vascular structure; segmenting the structure of interest within the 2D image data; expressing a difference between the structure of interest within the 3D image data and the structure of interest within the 2D image data as an energy that is calculated as a function of a measure of distance between the structure of interest within the 3D image data and the structure of interest within the 2D image data, a length preserving term, a smoothing term, and coefficients for balancing the length preserving term and smoothing term, respectively; and minimizing the expressed energy to perform non-rigid registration between the structure of interest within the 3D image data and the structure of interest within the 2D image data.