Efficient multi-object segmentation of 3D medical images using clustering and graph cuts

We propose an application of multi-label “Graph Cut” optimization algorithms to the simultaneous segmentation of multiple anatomical structures, initialized via an over-segmentation of the image computed by a fast centroidal Voronoi diagram (CVD) clustering algorithm. With respect to comparable segmentations computed directly on the voxels of image volumes, we demonstrate performance improvements on both execution speed and memory footprint by, at least, an order of magnitude, making it possible to process large volumes on commodity hardware which could not be processed pixel-wise.