The use of moving contrast sweep to increase the effectiveness of linear,non-linear and midtone shift contrast enhancement in mammography

Abstract

Low contrast in mammographic image has always made detection of subtle signs such as the presence of micro calcification within dense tissue a challenge. Therefore, numerous researches have been conducted on contrast enhancement technique for mammographic images. However, most of these methods focus on enhancing specific range of intensity level producing an enhanced version of the original image. This paper proposes a new approach in dealing with contrast enhancement for mammographic images. Instead of producing just a single image, the approach proposed here will generate multiple different images where each of them corresponds to a different range of intensity level. These images will then be combined together to form frames of a moving video which would display seamless transition from one intensity level to another. As a result, the radiologist who is performing visual inspection of the image can sweep through the entire range of intensity level of the image which has been contrast enhanced.