Segmentation of solid nodules in ultrasonographic breast image based on wavelet transform.

An accurate segmentation of solid nodules in ultrasonographic (US) breast image is presented. 1-level 2-dimensional Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) is used to create features reflecting the texture information of the original image. Using these features, the texture classification is achieved. Finally, solid nodule region is segmented from the classified texture region. Proper threshold for texture classification is automatically decided. Empirically acquired information about the relationship between the texture characteristic of the original image and the optimal threshold is examined and used. Presented algorithm is applied to 284 malignant solid nodules and 300 benign solid nodules and the resulting images are presented.