Diagnosing breast cancer using independent diffuse optical tomography and x-ray mammography scans

We have previously demonstrated the utilization of spatially co-registered diffuse optical tomography (DOT) and digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) for joint breast cancer diagnosis. However, clinical implementation of such a multi-modality approach may require development of integrated DOT/DBT imaging scanners, which can be costly and time-consuming. Exploring effective image registration methods that combine the diagnostic information from a standalone DOT measurement and a separate mammogram can be a cost-effective solution, which may eventually enable adding functional optical assessment to all previously installed digital mammography systems. In this study, we investigate a contour-based image registration method to convert independent optical and x-ray scans into co-registered datasets that can benefit from a joint image analysis. The breast surface used in 3D optical DOT reconstruction is registered with the breast contour line extracted from an x-ray mammogram acquired separately. This allows us to map the 2D mammogram to the optical measurement space and build structural constraints for optical image reconstruction. A non-linear reconstruction utilizing structure-priors is then performed to produce hemoglobin maps with improved resolution. To validate this approach, we used a set of tumor patient measurements with simultaneous DOT/DBT and separate 2D mammographic scans. The images recovered from the registration procedure derived from DOT and 2D mammogram present similar image quality compared to those recovered from co-registered DOT/DBT measurements.