Noise-Based Image Harmonization Significantly Increases Repeatability and Reproducibility of Radiomics Features in PET Images: A Phantom Study.

ABSTRACT: For multicenter clinical studies, characterizing the robustness of image-derived radiomics features is essential. Features calculated on PET images have been shown to be very sensitive to image noise. The purpose of this work was to investigate the efficacy of a relatively simple harmonization strategy on feature robustness and agreement. A purpose-built texture pattern phantom was scanned on 10 different PET scanners in 7 institutions with various different image acquisition and reconstruction protocols. An image harmonization technique based on equalizing a contrast-to-noise ratio was employed to generate a "harmonized" alongside a "standard" dataset for a reproducibility study. In addition, a repeatability study was performed with images from a single PET scanner of variable image noise

SUBMITTER: Keller H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9025788 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature