Outlining the prostate boundary using the harmonics method

In a computerised ultrasound image guidance for automated prostatectomy sys tem, if is necessary to identify a smooth, continuous contour for the prost ate (boundary) from the ultrasound image. The radial bas-relief (RBR) metho d, which has been reported previously, can extract a skeletonised image fro m an ultrasound image automatically. After this process the prostate bounda ry is clearly revealed. However, analysis of the image is far from complete , as there are many spurious branches that create too much ambiguity for th e system to define the actual boundary. There are also sections missing fro m the prostate boundary. Therefore further post-processing is required to d escribe and define the prostate boundary, in the paper, the harmonics metho d is used to describe the prostate boundary. The harmonics method uses Four ier information for noise removal and encodes a smooth boundary. The result s of using the harmonics method after application of the RBR method on ultr asound images are presented. Factors that affect the performance are also h ighlighted and discussed.