FULLY-AUTOMATIC SEGMENTATION OF THE BRAIN IN MRI

A robust fully automatic method for segmenting the brain from head mag netic resonance (MR) images has been developed, which works even in th e presence of radio frequency (RF) inhomogeneities. It has been succes sful in segmenting the brain in every slice from head images acquired from several different MRI scanners, using different-resolution images and different echo sequences. The method uses an integrated approach which employs image processing techniques based on anisotropic filters and ''snakes'' contouring techniques, and a priori knowledge, which i s used to remove the eyes, which are tricky to remove based on image i ntensity alone, It is a multistage process, involving first removal of the background noise leaving a head mask, then finding a rough outlin e of the brain, then refinement of the rough brain outline to a final mask. The paper describes the main features of the method, and gives r esults for some brain studies.