CLASSIFICATION OF LUNG-TUMORS ON CHEST RADIOGRAPHS BY FRACTAL TEXTUREANALYSIS

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES. The authors determine the usefulness of frac tal texture analysis in classification of lung tumors on chest radiogr aphs. METHODS. A method of fractal texture analysis was applied for cl assification of lung tumors on digitized chest radiographs, It was per formed in 15 cases of benign lesions and in 26 cases of malignant tumo rs, All lesions were proved by histology, For classification, the frac tal distances of the tumors were calculated and an energy measure rela ted to the variances as a second characteristic was applied, The resul ts were compared with those of a conventional classification method ba sed on the cooccurrence matrix. RESULTS. Although the conventional met hod failed in classification of lung tumors, a clear separation betwee n benign and malignant lesions was attained by fractal analysis, A dif ferentiation between primary lung cancer and metastases was not possib le. CONCLUSIONS. The results of our study demonstrate the usefulness o f fractal texture analysis for classification of lung tumors on chest radiographs.