S. Vijaya Kumar et. al.

/ International Journal of Engineering Science and Technology

Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

A Novel Method for the Detection of

Microcalcifications Based on Multi-scale
Morphological Gradient Watershed
Segmentation Algorithm
S. Naveen Lazarus*, M.Naveen Lazarus**, C. Nagaraju***

* Asst. Professor in IT, RGMCET, Nandyal.

** M.Tech (IInd year), RGMCET, Nandyal.
***Professor & Head of IT, LBR College of Engineering, Mylavaram.
E-mail: svksr105@yahoo.co.in , naveen.lazarus@gmail.com, cnrcse@yahoo.com

Abstract:

This paper presents an automated system for detecting masses in mammogram images. Breast cancer is one of
the leading causes of women mortality in the world. Since the causes are unknown, breast cancer cannot be
prevented. It is difficult for radiologists to provide both accurate and uniform evaluation over the enormous
number of mammograms generated in widespread screening. Microcalcifications (calcium deposits) and masses
are the earliest signs of breast carcinomas and their detection is one of the key issues for breast cancer control.
Computer-aided detection of Microcalcifications and masses is an important and challenging task in breast
cancer control. This paper presents a novel approach for detecting microcalcification clusters. First digitized
mammogram has been taken from Mammography Image Analysis Society (MIAS) database. The Mammogram
is preprocessed using Adaptive median filtered. Next, the microcalcification clusters are identified by using the
marker extractions of the gradient images obtained by multiscale morphological reconstruction and avoids Over
segmentation vivid in Watershed algorithm. Experimental result show that the microcalcification can be
accurately and efficiently detected using the proposed approach.
Keywords: Mammograms, Micro-calcification, pre-processing, segmentation, watershed transform.
1. Introduction
Breast cancer is one of the leading cancers in the female population. About 25% of all cancers diagnosed in
women are breast cancers and about 20% of all lethal cancers are breast cancers. It is the leading cause of death
due to cancer in women [1].The risk of developing Breast Cancer can be reduced by: Having children before 30,
Breast-feeding, Limiting alcohol intake, maintaining a healthy weight, exercising regularly [2]. Early detection
is the key to improving breast cancer prognosis. Mammograms have been shown to be one of the most reliable
methods for early detection of breast carcinomas. Although computer-aided mammography has been studied for
two decades, automated interpretation of micro calcifications is still very difficult. The dense tissues, and
especially in younger women, cause suspicious region to be almost invisible and may be easily misinterpreted as
calcifications and yield a high False Positive (FP) rate that is a major problem with most of the existing
algorithms. Double readings, as carried out, for example, by two radiologists, usually improve the quality of
diagnostic findings, thus, greatly reducing the probability of misdiagnosis.[3] On these grounds, adequate
computational tools are expected to be helpful to the radiologist. The method we proposed is simple to detect the
micro calcification clusters based on multi-scale morphological Gradient watershed segmentation algorithm.
This paper is organized as follows. Section 2 introduces Mammogram image Acquisition and
preprocessing using Adaptive median filter. In Section 3, Morphological Reconstruction of Mammogram image
is described. In Section 4, Generation of Gradient image is presented .In Section 5, Generation of Final Gradient
image is presented. In Section 6, Marker Extraction is presented. In Section 7, Clustering based on segmentation
is applied .The experimental results are presented in Section 8 and Section 9 concludes the work.
2. Image Acquisition and Pre-Processing
The Mammography Image Analysis Society (MIAS), which is an organization of United Kingdom research
groups interested in the understanding of mammograms, has produced a digital mammography database. The
data collection that was used in this experiment was taken from the Mammography Image Analysis Society
(MIAS). This data is available at ftp://peipa.essex.ac.uk.

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

2.1 Pre-processing
The pre-processing phase is the most important step in mammogram image analysis. Adaptive Median filtering
has been found to be very powerful in removing noise from two-dimensional signals without blurring edges.
This makes it particularly suitable for enhancing mammogram images.
Adaptive Median Filter:
Adaptive median filter works on a rectangular region Sxy. It changes the size of Sxy during the filtering
operation depending on certain conditions as listed below [4, 5].The output of the filter is a single value which
replaces the current pixel value at (x, y), the point on which S is centered at the time [6]. The following notation
is used:

Zmin = minimum pixel value in Sxy

Zmax = maximum pixel value in Sxy
Zmed = median pixel value in Sxy
Zxy= pixel value at coordinates (x, y)
Smax = maximum allowed size of Sxy
The adaptive median filter works in two levels, denoted Level A and Level B, as follows:

Level A:
If Zmin <Zmed <Zmax
Go to level B
Else
Increase the window size
If window size <= Smax
Repeat level A
Else
Output Zxy

Level B:

If Zmin <Zxy <Zmax I

Output Zxy
Else
Output Zmed

First mammogram image (mdb030 G MISC B 322 676 43) has be taken from MIAS database and pre-processed
using Adaptive median filtered as mentioned above. The result of preprocessed mammogram image is displayed
in section 8, fig 8.2.

Block Diagram for Detection of Micro calcification:

Mammogram Image Pre-processing using Image Reconstruction using

Acquisition Adaptive median Filter Morphological operations

Marker Extraction Final Gradeint Image Multi-scale Gradient Image

Generation Generation

Watershed Segmentation Clustered Output Image

Fig 1. Block Diagram for Detection of Micro calcification

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

3. Morphological Reconstruction of Mammogram Image

The Preprocessed mammogram image is morphologically reconstructed for smoothening the interior objects i.e.
calcium deposits [7]. The basic morphological operators involved in this phase are listed below.

The two most fundamental morphological operations are dilation and erosion. Dilation of the image, f by the 4
or 8 connected structuring element (SE), B expands the image while the erosion of f by B shrinks the image.
Dilation and erosion can be represented as ∂ (f) (s,t) , ε(f) (s,t) .

The smoothening of the calcium deposits i.e. micro calcifications is performed using the morphological closing
by partial reconstruction operator, (Фk) on the pre processed, dilated image, ∂(f) with a reference image, φk(f)
which is obtained by closing the pre-processed image k times. This is given by

MF( f) = Φ(rec) (∂(f), φk (f)) 0≤ k ≤ n (1)

Where φk(f) is the closing of the mammogram image, where n is the size of the structure element, B. The output
of this phase result is displayed in section 8, fig 8.3.

4 .Multi-scale Gradient Image Generation

The gradient magnitude is used often to preprocess a gray-scale image prior to use the watershed transform for
segmentation[8].The gradient magnitude image of mammogram has high pixel values along object(calcium
deposits) edges and low pixel values everywhere else. The gradient image, G (f) is morphologically obtained by
subtracting the eroded image, ε (f) from its dilated version, ∂(f) . A multiscale gradient, MG(f) is the average of
morphological gradients taken for different scales of the structure element, Bi.

MG (f) = 1/n ∑ [ε (∂ (MF (f), Bi ) – (MF(f),Bi ),B i-1)] (2)

Where Bi is a SE of size (2i+1)x (2i+1).

The noise and quantization errors in the homogenous regions of the image may produce many insignificant
minima in the resulting gradient image which causes over segmentation when subjected to watershed
segmentation algorithm. The multi-scale gradient image is displayed in section 8, fig 8.4.

To overcome this i.e. to eliminate the irrelevant minima, Final Gradient image can be generated by using Multi-
scale Gradient image.

5. Final Gradient Image Generation

To eliminate the irrelevant minima, the multiscale gradient image, MG (f) is dilated with a SE of smaller size.
The local minima with very low contrast can be removed by adding a constant gray value, h which is
approximately 30 percentile of histogram of the dilated MG (f).A Final Gradient image, FG (f) is obtained by
reconstructing the multiscale gradient image, MG (f) with its dilated image as a reference image.

FG(f)Φ(rec) MGf B + h , MGf

The final gradient image which is obtained by using the above morphological reconstruction is displayed in
section 8, fig 8.5.

6. Marker Extraction

Marker extraction is an important step in morphological segmentation procedure. The goal of marker extraction
is to detect the presence of homogeneous regions on the mammogram [9]. The Watershed segmentation
algorithm applied directly to the gradient image can cause over-segmentation due to serious noise or image
irregularities. The over segmentation image after directly applying watershed segmentation is displayed in
section 8, fig 8.6.

To solve this over-segmentation problem markers are used whose goal is to detect the presence of homogeneous
regions from the image. Internal markers are inside each of the objects of interest and external markers are
contained within the back-ground. By a set of morphological simplifications. Marker Extraction involves

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

production of markers by identifying the interior of the objects to be segmented. Due to the presence of large no
of regional minimas the over segmentation arising. The regional minimas can be seen in section 8, fig 8.7.

6.1 Internal Markers

Most of the regional minimas are very shallow and represent detail that is irrelevant to our segmentation
problem. To eliminate these extraneous minima, internal markers [11] are obtained. Internal Markers are
associated wit h the objects of interest. Internal markers can mark the objects of the mammogram image.
Internal marker image is displayed in section 8, fig 8.8.

6.2 External Markers

External Markers [11] are belonging to background are calculated. These markers can be calculated by finding
pixels that are exactly midway between the internal markers. External marker image is displayed in section 8,fig
8.9.

After finding the internal and external markers, modified gradient image can be generated so that the
mammogram image is modified since regional minima occur only in the marked locations. Other pixel values
are pushed up as necessary to remove all other regional minima.

From the marker modified gradient image (fig we can observe that calcium deposits i.e. microcalcifications
which are represented using the internal markers separated by external markers and imposed on final Gradient
image. The marker modified gradient image is displayed in section 8, fig 8.10.

7. Watershed Segmentation

The Final Gradient image which is marker extracted is subjected to Watershed Segmentation. Watershed
segmentation [10]-[11] produces a more stable segmentation of objects including continuous segmentation
boundaries by a concept of producing catchments basin (watershed) and watershed line (divide lines or dam
boundaries). Watershed transformation is applied on the Modified marker gradient image. Thus the watershed
algorithm is provided the image C(f) which was obtained from Modified marker gradient image(MMGI) and
original image .After applying watershed transformation on MMGI superimpose the watershed ridge line on the
original mammogram image. The segmentation using watershed algorithm is displayed in section 8, fig11.

8. Experimental results

Fig 8.1 Original Mammogram Image Fig 8.2 Filtered Mammogram Image
(Mdb030 G MISC B 322 676 43) Using adaptive median filter.

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

Fig 8.3 Morphologically reconstructed Fig 8.4 Multi-scale Gradient Image

Fig 8.5 Final Gradient Image Generation Fig2.6 Over-segmentation problem

Fig 8.7 Regional minimas of Final Gradient image. Fig 8.8 Internal Marker image of mammogram.

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

Fig 8.9 External Marker image Fig 8.10 Marker modified gradient image

Fig 8.11 detection of microcalfications

on the original image (Segmented image).

9. Conclusions:

In this paper, we have applied a novel approach to the detection of micro-calcifications based on Multi-scale
Morphological gradient watershed algorithm on mammogram image .This method is simple and would give
better segmentation results .We applied this algorithm on the 36 samples of mammograms ,while detection rate
of the proposed methodology is equals to the doctor’s detection.

This paper has highlighted a method for detection of microcalcifications in breast at an early stage by Digital
mammogram image analysis. The problem here is to differentiate between the benign and malignant tumors. For
this, one has to go for the biopsy of the suspected malignant tumors.

References:
[1] S. Detounis. Computer-Aided Detection and Second Reading Utility and Implementation in a High-Volume ,Breast Clinic. Applied
Radiology, 8-15, 2004.
[2] 2.K.Thangavel, M.Karnan,” Computer Aided Diagnosis in Digital Mammograms:Detection of Microcalcifications by Meta Heuristic
Algorithms”, ICGST-GVIP Journal, Volume (5), Issue (7), July 2005.
[3] K. Thangavel, M. Karnan, R. Siva Kumar, and A. Kaja Mohideen. Automatic Detection of Microcalcifications in Mammograms–A
Review. International Journal onGraphics Vision and Image Processing. 5, 2005.
[4] Yanming Zhao, Dongmei Li, and Zhaohui Li,” Performance enhancement and analysis of an adaptive median filter”.
[5] R.C. Gonzalez and R.E. Woods, Digital Image Processing-Second Edition (Beijing, Publishing House of Electronics Industry, 2003).
[6] H. Hwang, and R. A. Haddad, Adaptive median filters: new algorithms and results, IEEE Trans. Image Processing, 4, 499 (1995).
[7] P.Salembier and J.Serra. “Morphological Multiscale Image Segmentation” in proc. Visual Communication and Image Processing,
Boston, MA.1992.

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Vol. 2(7), 2010, 2616-2622

[8] Krishnan Nallaperumal, K.Krishnaveni,” A novel Multi-scale Morphological Watershed SegmentationAlgorithm”,

IJISE,GA,USA,ISSN:1934 9955, VOL.1,NO.2, APRIL 2007.
[9] S.Anusuya ,”Morphological segmentation of digital images based on multiscale gradient watershed algorithm”.
[10] S. Beucher. The Watershed Transformation Applied to Image Segmentation. Proc. Pfefferkorn Conf. on Signal and Image Processing
in Microscopy and Microanalysis, Cambridge, UK, pp. 299-314, Sept. 1991.
[11] R. Lotufo,W. Silva, Minimal set of markers for the watershed transform, in: Proc. ISMM2002

S.Vijaya Kumar Received the B.Tech (CSE) degree from KSRM College of
Engineering in 2004. He received the M.Tech (CS) degree from RGMCET Nandyal in
2007. At present he is working as Assistant Professor in the department of IT at
RGMCET, Nandyal. He has got 5 years of teaching experience. His research interest
includes Image Processing, Pattern Recognition, and Ant colony optimization. He has 5
research papers in various national and international journal and conferences. He has 2
seminars and workshops. He is member of various professional societies like
ISTE,IAENG ,IACSIT and CSI

M.Naveen Lazarus Received the B.Tech (CSE) from M R R I T S in 2007. He is

pursuing M.Tech (IInd year) in R G M College of Engineering and Technology,
Nandyal . He has one research paper in national conference. His area of interests
includes Image Processing, Pattern Recognition, and Ant colony optimization. He has 3
research papers in various national and international journal and conferences. He is
member of various professional societies like ISTE,IAENG, CSI.

C.NagaRaju received his B.Tech degree in Computer Science from J.N.T.University

Anantapur, M.Tech degree in Computer Science from J.N.T.University Hyderabad and
submitted his Ph.D in digital Image processing from J.N.T.University Hyderabad.
Currently, he is working as a professor and Head in the Department of Computer Science
& Engineering in Lakireddy Balireddy College of Engineering, mylavaram. He has got 16
years of teaching experience .He has published seventeen research papers in various
national and international journals and about twenty eight research papers in various
national and international conferences. He has attended twenty seminars and workshops.
He is member of various professional societies like IEEE, ISTE and CSI.

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