In this paper we present a novel method for analyzing and visualizing dynamic peristaltic motion of the colon in 3D from two series of differently oriented 2D MRI images. To this end, we have defined an MRI examination protocol, and introduced methods for spatio-temporal alignment of the two MRI image series into a common reference. This represents the main contribution of this paper, which enables the 3D analysis of peristaltic motion. The objective is to provide a detailed insight into this complex motion, aiding in the diagnosis and characterization of colon motion disorders. We have applied the proposed spatio-temporal method on Cine MRI data sets of healthy volunteers. The results have been inspected and validated by an expert radiologist. Segmentation and cylindrical approximation of the colon results in a 4D visualization of the peristaltic motion.

Date Published: 17 March 2008
PDF: 8 pages
Proc. SPIE 6915, Medical Imaging 2008: Computer-Aided Diagnosis, 69152G (17 March 2008); doi: 10.1117/12.769810

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 6915:
Medical Imaging 2008: Computer-Aided Diagnosis
Maryellen L. Giger; Nico Karssemeijer, Editor(s)