Medical Image Computing and Signal Processing Lab

In clinical applications, reduced slice width acquisition poses serious limitation on the imaging speed. Since angiograms are obtained using intensity projections, the introduction of blur due to large slice widths in the individual slices can cause a cumulative degradation of vascular structures in the Maximum/Minimum Intensity Projected (M/mIP) images. Besides, reduction in self-similarity of vascular structures pose additional constraints in application of diffusion based filters. Non-Local diffusion based filtering scheme with capability for spatially localized application. The spatial localization enables suppression of salt and pepper noise generated due to the filtering process. While application of other diffusion based methods fail to enhance venous contrast using minimum intensity projections, this performs equally well for both M/mIP in combination with suitably generated phase masks.