REVIEW OF VARIOUS HISTOGRAM BASED MEDICAL
IMAGE ENHANCEMENT TECHNIQUES ∗
† ‡
Vidyasaraswathi H N
Assistant Professor
Bangalore Institute of Technology, Dept of ECE
K R Road, Bangalore
Karnataka,India
vidya.gowdaec@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Image enhancement is a processing on an image to make
it more suitable for some applications. The main problem
addressed by this paper is the enhancement of medical im-
ages using efficient algorithms based on HE techniques. The
paper involves analyzing and formulating different HE im-
age enhancement techniques suitable for various medical ap-
plications. More precisely, proposed research will focus on
the enhancement of medical images captured under poor
illumination conditions, foggy situations and speckle noise
etc.. Developing algorithms that would assist doctors to
diagnose the disease in the beginning stage only. For ex-
ample the removal of speckle noise and artifacts with seg-
menting kidney from those images where kidney boundary
are not much clear. Medical images are enhanced using ef-
ficient Histogram Equalization(HE) techniques such as It-
erative dynamic HE, Dualistic sub-image HE, Background
brightness preserving HE, Gray-level and gradient magni-
tude HE. For improving the performance of image process-
ing systems the crucial solution is implementation of image
processing techniques in hardware. Therefore for improving
the performance of image processing systems, for flexible de-
sign development, more compact, low power, and high speed
and to reduce cost and time, gives the implementation of ef-
ficient histogram algorithms on Field Programmable Gate
Array (FPGA).
Categories and Subject Descriptors
I.4.3 [Enhancement]: Fpga [; []: ]
∗(Does NOT produce the permission block, copyright
information nor page numbering). For use with
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†Dr. Trovato insisted his name be first.
‡The secretary disavows any knowledge of this author’s ac-
tions.
Dr.M C.Hanumantharaju
Associate Professor
BMS Institute of Technology
Avalahalli,Yelahanka Bangalore
Karnataka ,India
mchanumantharaju@gmail.com
General Terms
Algorithms,Theory
Keywords
Image enhancement, histogram equalization, FPGA, con-
trast enhancement.
1. INTRODUCTION
In modern world due to the changing life style of human be-
ings, everyday new types of diseases are emerging. ItâĂŹs
an everyday challenge for doctors to effectively diagnose
these diseases and provide remedy. Many of the diseases
like breast cancer, retinal fundus, kidney disorders, spinal
card problems, heart problems result in enormous amount
of digital data either in the form of sound, images, or videos.
Efficient analyses of these images are necessary for success-
ful diagnosis of diseases. Sophisticated hardware and soft-
ware knowledge is quite essential in this regard. Medical
images like mammogram, retinal, ultrasound, bones, chest
etc., form a major diagnostic tool. All of these images can
be captured by using hardware device like camera. These
images do not give the proper information required for anal-
ysis of diseases due to electrical fluctuations, environmen-
tal change, not expert in using the device. Therefore, to
enhance the low contrast image and to highlight the im-
portant details of image, image enhancement is required.
Several researchers have proposed numerous image enhance-
ment algorithms like Histogram equalization (HE), gamma
correction, homomorphic filter etc. In recent years, digi-
tal image enhancement have been widely used in many ap-
plications areas such as medicine, space exploration, auto-
mated industry inspection, authentication etc. The image
enhancement technique principal objective is to process a
given image to modify the attributes or features of an image
so that the result is most suitable than the original image
for a specific applications. It accentuates or sharpens im-
age features such as edges, boundaries, or contrast to make
a graphic display more helpful for display and analysis to
diagnose a particular problem. The enhancement doesn’t
increase the inherent information content of the data, but it
increases the dynamic range of the chosen features so that
they can be detected easily. Low contrast image analysis is
a problem in medical image processing, since it reduces the
ability of pathologists in analyzing the images. Therefore,
a well known and straightforward scheme for contrast en-
hancement is HE. HE is a method that improves the contrast
in an image, in order to stretch out the intensity range. Due
to its simplicity, moderate and for better performance on im-
ages HE method is used in most of the techniques. In this
research work, study of various HE methods such as Global
Histogram Equalization (GHE), Local Histogram Equaliza-
tion (LHE), Adaptive Histogram Equalization (AHE), Con-
trast Limited Adaptive Histogram Equalization (CLAHE)
etc is adopted and have to propose new algorithm to en-
hance medical images. HE methods improve the quality of
the information in an image; hence can be used in field of
medical where the quality of the scans can be enhanced to
diagnose the patientâĂŹs disease accurately and efficiently.
The Tumor images can be enhanced to segment the proper
boundary of the tumor which helps in accurate treatment
for the patient. The eye images can be enhanced to get
proper view which helps to detect any eye diseases such as
Diabetic Macular edema, Glaucoma etc. For mismammo-
gram images to find exact location of cancerous regions and
also for low dose CT images to find tiny anatomies like ves-
sels, lugs nodules, airways, pulmonary fissures etc. Using
HE improve the image contrast to enhance the image qual-
ity of retinal vessels used in diagnosis of diseases such as
diabetes and high blood pressure. Similarly CT scans, MRI
scans, and Ultrasound and any other Bio-Medical related
scans can be enhanced in concern of the accurate detection
and classification of diseases and also the treatment. The
architectural approach used for implementation of image en-
hancement algorithms are classified into different categories
are General purpose processor(GPP), Digital signal proces-
sor(DIPs), Application specific integrated circuits(ASICs)
and Field programmable Gate Array(FPGA). Depending
on the time consumption, cost, speed, flexibility, memory
used, throughput and other requirements a particular ap-
proach can be chosen. In GPP approach, the throughput
of the system decreases and also it is limited in perfor-
mance because its instructions are executed in sequence and
they are not suited for fast processing of high resolution
of image enhancement methods. In DSP approach, only
marginal improvement can achieved because parallelism and
pipelining incorporated in design are inadequate. The hard-
ware implementation of image enhancement technique has
been strongly influenced by the evolution of VLSI technol-
ogy. The complex computation tasks such as 2D convolu-
tion, filtering, averaging, normalization, smoothing and con-
trast stretching operations encountered in image enhance-
ment techniques are well suited for VLSI implementations.
In addition, VLSI based hardware implementation exploits
pipelining and massive parallel processing operations, resul-
tinin increased speed and throughput of the image enhance-
ment In ASIC implementation, the performance can be in-
creased but it takes a large time to market and cost is high.
So it is used for high volume productions. For high speed
and throughput FPGA becomes a right choice. The FPGA
implementation can use fully the data and I/O parallelism
for image enhancement applications. FPGA implementa-
tion of image enhancement techniques is cost effective for
low volume productions. Therefore, in this research work
FPGAs are preferred in order to implement the histogram
based image enhancement algorithms.
In BPDHE method the original image is decomposed into
multiple sub images according to their local maxima, then
the dynamic histogram equalization is applied to each sub
2. CONVENTIONAL IMAGE ENHANCEMENT image and finally, the sub Images are combined. It di-
TECHNIQUES vides the histogram based on the local maxima. It pro-
2.1 Histogram Equalization (HE)
Histogram equalization is widely used for contrast enhance-
ment in a variety of applications like computer vision, re-
mote sensing, medical image analysis etc., due to its simple
function and effectiveness. It works by using the cumulative
density function of the image by flattening the histogram
and stretching the dynamic range of the gray levels. One
problem of the histogram equalization is that the brightness
of an image is changed after the histogram equalization
2.2 Adaptive HE Technique(AHE)
AHE differs from the normal HE method in the respect
that HE generates only one histogram whereas AHE method
computes several histograms corresponding to a distinct sec-
tion of the image and uses that to redistribute the intensity
values of the image. By using ADE method can improve
the detection of spiculations on dense mammographic back-
grounds. Saeid et al.[3], proposed an adaptive HE method
for segmentation of blood vessels in color retinal images.In
this method, focus on two methods of retinal vessel segmen-
tation including first derivative of Gaussian matched filter
and Gaussian matched filter. AHE improves the image con-
trast to enhance the image quality of retinal vessels used in
diagnosis of diseases such as diabetes and high blood pres-
sure. This method showed an accuracy of 0.9353 a raise of
about 2 percent compared to existing methods. Analysis
of this approach shows that AHE method used in retinal
vessel segmentation is based on threshold. Therefore, this
approach is suitable for specific type of images
2.3 Histogram Modified Contrast Limited Adap-
tive Histogram Equalization (HM CLAHE)
Sundaram et al. [26] proposed to adjust the level of con-
trast enhancement, which in turn gives the resultant image
a strong contrast and brings the local details for more rel-
evant interpretation and this proposed technique provides
better contrast enhancement with preserving the local in-
formation of the mammogram images. Shibin et al. [7],
proposed a new algorithm for feature and contrast enhance-
ment of mammographic images based on multiscale trans-
form and mathematical morphology. In this algorithm the
Laplacian Gaussian pyramid transform is applied first to
decompose the mammography into different multiscale sub-
band sub-images. Further the detail or high frequency sub-
images are equalized by using the Contrast Limited Adap-
tive Histogram Equalization (CLAHE) and low frequency
sub-images are processed by using mathematical morphol-
ogy. Finally, the enhanced image of feature and contrast
is reconstructed from the Laplacian Gaussian pyramid coef-
ficients modified by using CLAHE and mathematical mor-
phology. Therefore, the performance evaluation of the this
algorithm is based on, signal-noise-ratio (SNR) and contrast
improvement index (CII). And the research result shows the
algorithm yield better image contrast compared to AHE.
2.4 Brightness Preserving Dynamic Histogram
Equalization (BPDHE)
duces the output image with the mean intensity almost equal
to the mean intensity of the input, thus fulfils the require-
ment of maintaining the mean brightness of the image. This
method smoothes the input histograms with one dimensional
Gaussian filter, and then partitions the smoothed histogram
based on its local maxima. After that it assigns new dy-
namic range to each partition. Then, the histogram equal-
ization process is applied independently to these partitions,
based on this new dynamic range and the output image is
normalized to the input mean brightness. Nungsanginla et
al. [17], provided an analysis and comparison of the various
techniques of image enhancement through histogram equal-
ization are overviewed. The result is that Brightness pre-
serving Dynamic Histogram Equalization (BPDHE) tech-
nique provides better and scalable brightness preservation
for images with poor contrast. The advantage of BBPHE
is it allows higher level of brightness preservation to avoid
unwanted noises.
2.5 Sharp Contrast Limited Adaptive Histogram
Equalization (SCLAHE) 4.
Siti et al. [12], study on the identification of dental abnor-
malities in intra-oral dental radiographs. The abnormalities
are Periapical Radiolucency (PA), widen periodontal liga-
ment space (widen PDLs) and Loss of Lamina Dura (Loss of
LD). Image processing techniques such as Contrast enhance-
ment algorithms (CEAs) are accepted in dentistry in en-
hancing digital dental radiographs and assisting the dentists
during interpretation process. Thus it compares the perfor-
mance between original images and the images enhanced by
CEAs. The algorithms are Adaptive Histogram Equaliza-
tion (AHE), Contrast Limited Adaptive Histogram Equal-
ization (CLAHE) and Sharp Contrast Limited Adaptive His-
togram Equalization (SCLAHE). The researchers mentioned
that the future work will be conducted to focus on further
investigation on the gray scale properties of the images that
contribute in detecting the abnormalities.
3. RELATED WORK
Breast cancer is most common cancer in women. Due to the
low contrast nature of mammographic images it is compli-
cated to identify signs such as bilateral asymmetry, archi-
tectural distortion and masses etc [1]. Here Adaptive HE
technique (AHE) is used to differentiate between benign or
malignant tissues.AHE differs from the normal HE method
in the respect that HE generates only one histogram whereas
AHE method computes several histograms corresponding to
a distinct section of the image and uses that to redistribute
the intensity values of the image [9]. In [12], by using ADE
method can improve the detection of speculations on dense
mammographic backgrounds. This is better enhancement
method for medical images and also incorporates histogram
modifications as an optimization technique, but produces
noise over amplification. For that reason have to extract
more features of mass and classify to identify benign or ma-
lignant patients for early recognition of syndrome by using
other techniques.
In recent years ultrasound images used as imaging modalities
to detect and diagnose human organ and tissue related disor-
ders like to early detection of kidney disorders and diseases,
but due to the presence of speckle noise and low contrast in
ultrasound imaging detection of tissues and also to detect
structural abnormalities becomes difficult. In [11], proposed
a method to develop and implement a system that can seg-
ment human kidney from ultrasound images, usable during
surgical operations like punctures but this method is not
suitable when image boundary is not clear. Therefore work
includes removal of speckle noise and artifacts with segment-
ing images where image boundaries are not much clear by
using different segmentation techniques. Ultrasound images
have poor contrast due to the presence of granular speckle
noise. In [13], proposed algorithm aims to improve the abil-
ity to differentiate between healthy and malignant condi-
tions via the use of homomorphic filtering and OtsuâĂŹs
gray-level histogram thresholding. Homomorphic filtering is
based on its principle of reducing the dynamic range and
thereby increasing the local contrast. But this method loses
some of the image texture. Therefore to improve trade-off
between image contrast and resolution in context of preser-
vation of textural information and reduced blurring of sam-
ple the HE algorithms can be adopted.
METHODOLOGYS
Iterative Dynamic HE technique In [2], proposed the itera-
tive sub-histogram equalization method, which helps to en-
hance better contrast than any other brightness preserving
enhancing techniques.
Dualistic Sub Image Histogram Equalization (DSIHE) Du-
alistic sub-image histogram equalization (DSIHE) also sep-
arates the input histogram into two subsections. DSIHE
chooses to separate the histogram based on gray level with
cumulative probability density .The result of the dualistic
sub-image histogram equalization is obtained after the two
equalized sub images are composed into one image . Bright-
ness Bi-Histogram Equalization (BBHE) BBHE method is
used to decompose the original image into two sub-images,
by using the image mean gray-level, and then apply the HE
method on each of the subimages. The BBHE method pro-
duces an output image with the value of brightness (mean
gray-level) located in the middle of the mean of the input
image. The BBHE technique is a hybrid method between
mean brightness preserving histogram equalization methods
with clipped histogram equalization method. This technique
can enhance the images without producing unnecessary ar-
tifacts.
By applying these techniques the problems explained in sec-
tion 3 is overcome.
5. CONCLUSION
The main problem addressed by this paper is the enhance-
ment of medical images using efficient algorithms based on
HE techniques. The proposed research involves analyzing
and formulating different HE image enhancement techniques
suitable for various medical applications. More precisely,
proposed research will focus on the enhancement of medical
images captured under poor illumination conditions, foggy
situations and speckle noise. Therefore design of algorithm
for histogram based medical image enhancement using the
techniques Iterative Dynamic HE, DSIHE, and BBHE can
overcome the problems explained in section 3 which include
the applications breast cancer, kidney diseases etc. Devel-
oping algorithms that would assist doctors to diagnose the
disease in the beginning stage only. For example the removal
of speckle noise and artifacts with segmenting kidney from
those images where kidney boundary are not much clear. For
improving the performance of image processing systems the
crucial solution is implementation of image processing tech-
niques in hardware. Also for improving the performance of
image processing systems, for flexible design development,
more compact, low power, and high speed and to reduce cost
and time, gives the implementation of efficient histogram al-
gorithms on Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) with
pipelining and parallel processing.
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