Patent ID: 7298879

Claim:
A method of forming an image of body structures from an image data set, notably for highlighting potential nodular structures in a lung, which method includes the steps of a) forming a binary data set in which the pixels present in the image data set are subdivided into pixels which are to be marked and those which are not to be marked, in which step a1. a first filtering operation is performed in which a distance value is determined for each pixel, which distance value corresponds to the shortest distance between the pixel and the edge of the image structure in which the pixel is situated, and in which those pixels are selected from the binary data set whose distance value is below a predetermined distance limit value, a2. a second filtering operation is performed in which those previously selected pixels remain selected which are directly neighbored in both directions of at least one straight line, extending through the pixel, by two pixels having a smaller distance value, a3. a third filtering operation is performed in which those previously selected pixels remain selected for which the surrounding pixels, situated at a distance corresponding exactly to the distance value of the pixel, have a distance value which is a predetermined distance difference value smaller than the distance value of the pixel to be tested itself, b) forming a marked image data set from the image data set by marking the pixels having been selected after the last filtering operation in the binary data set, and c) forming the image of the body structure from the marked image data set.