Tissue block MRI for slice orientation-independent registration of digital histology images to ex vivo MRI of the prostate

We present a method for the registration of whole-mount digital histology images to ex vivo MR images of the prostate that relaxes the requirement for control over specimen slicing orientation. The approach uses extrinsic fiducials visible on histology and MRI, as well as block MR images of tissue slices after coarse sectioning, to support a two-stage registration approach: (1) registration of digital histology images to block MR images, and (2) registration of block MR images to whole-specimen ex vivo MR images. This work presents a preliminary quantitative validation on 4 clinical prostate specimens, yielding target registration errors of 0.6 mm and 0.5 mm, respectively, for the registration stages, measured using intrinsic fiducials.