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Classification of calcified regions in atherosclerotic lesions of the carotid artery in computed tomography angiography images

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Abstract

The identification of atherosclerotic plaque components, extraction and analysis of their morphology represent an important role towards the prediction of cardiovascular events. In this article, the classification of regions representing calcified components in computed tomography angiography (CTA) images of the carotid artery is tackled. The proposed classification model has two main steps: the classification per pixel and the classification per region. Features extracted from each pixel inside the carotid artery are submitted to four classifiers in order to determine the correct class, i.e. calcification or non-calcification. Then, geometrical and intensity features extracted from each candidate region resulting from the pixel classification step are submitted to the classification per region in order to determine the correct regions of calcified components. In order to evaluate the classification accuracy, the results of the proposed classification model were compared against ground truths of calcifications obtained from micro-computed tomography images of excised atherosclerotic plaques that were registered with in vivo CTA images. The average values of the Spearman correlation coefficient obtained by the linear discriminant classifier were higher than 0.80 for the relative volume of the calcified components. Moreover, the average values of the absolute error between the relative volumes of the classified calcium regions and the ones calculated from the corresponding ground truths were lower than 3%. The new classification model seems to be adequate as an auxiliary diagnostic tool for identifying calcifications and allowing their morphology assessment.

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Acknowledgements

This work was partially funded by Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), a funding agency in Brazil, under the PhD Grant with reference number 0543/13-6. The authors thank the funding of Project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000022—SciTech—Science and Technology for Competitive and Sustainable Industries, co-financed by “Programa Operacional Regional do Norte” (NORTE2020), through “Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional” (FEDER).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAPES Foundation - Ministry of Education of Brazil, Brasília, DF, 70040-020, Brazil

    Danilo Samuel Jodas

  2. Instituto de Ciência e Inovação em Engenharia Mecânica e Engenharia Industrial, Faculdade de Engenharia, Universidade do Porto, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, s/n, 4200-465, Porto, Portugal

    Danilo Samuel Jodas & João Manuel R. S. Tavares

  3. Universidade Estadual Paulista “Júlio de Mesquita Filho”, Rua Cristóvão Colombo, 2265, 15054-000, São José do Rio Preto, Brazil

    Aledir Silveira Pereira

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  1. Danilo Samuel Jodas
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Correspondence to João Manuel R. S. Tavares.

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Jodas, D.S., Pereira, A.S. & Tavares, J.M.R.S. Classification of calcified regions in atherosclerotic lesions of the carotid artery in computed tomography angiography images. Neural Comput & Applic 32, 2553–2573 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00521-019-04183-z

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