Choledochal cancer region detection in hyperspectral images using U-Net based models

Abstract

Cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) is a type of cancer that forms in the bile duct that carry digestive fluid from the liver. CCA is the primary form of liver cancer that affects population ranging from age 60 to 69 years. CCA is difficult to diagnose at an early stage. Hyperspectral (HS) imaging is an advanced imaging technique that combines spectroscopy with conventional imaging. HS imaging is an emerging field of study which can be used for early CCA detection. HS imaging involves capturing images across various spectral bands, which forms a three-dimensional data cube often called as hyperspectral data cube. In this study, we have utilized U-Net based models, namely U-Net and DenseUNet were used to perform semantic segmentation on the HS images of CCA tissues. A band selective approach was employed to derive a subset of meaningful bands based on the spectrum plot from the HS image. The HS images are further preprocessed with Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The models were further evaluated by computing the accuracy, AUC (Area under the ROC curve), sensitivity and specificity metrics. The proposed models, namely, U-Net and DenseUNet reported an overall accuracy of 73.47% and 77.09% respectively. The DenseUNet models outperforms the U-Net model on every evaluation metric. The proposed models were also compared with other state-of-the-art (SOTA) models trained on various HS dataset. This study explores the application of HS imaging in carcinoma detection. The findings of this study could be used for further enhancement of the approach.