Validation of catheter segmentation for MR-guided gynecologic cancer brachytherapy.

Segmentation of interstitial catheters from MRI needs to be addressed in order for MRI-based brachytherapy treatment planning to become part of the clinical practice of gynecologic cancer radiotherapy. This paper presents a validation study of a novel image-processing method for catheter segmentation. The method extends the distal catheter tip, interactively provided by the physician, to its proximal end, using knowledge of catheter geometry and appearance in MRI sequences.

Anatomical atlas-guided diffuse optical tomography of brain activation.

We describe a neuroimaging protocol that utilizes an anatomical atlas of the human head to guide diffuse optical tomography of human brain activation. The protocol is demonstrated by imaging the hemodynamic response to median-nerve stimulation in three healthy subjects, and comparing the images obtained using a head atlas with the images obtained using the subject-specific head anatomy. The results indicate that using the head atlas anatomy it is possible to reconstruct the location of the brain activation to the expected gyrus of the brain, in agreement with the results obtained with the subject-specific head anatomy.