Unveiling Lung Diseases in CT Scan Images With a Hybrid Bio‐Inspired Mutated Spider‐Monkey and Crow Search Algorithm

ABSTRACT Bio‐inspired computer‐aided diagnosis (CAD) has garnered significant attention in recent years due to the inherent advantages of bio‐inspired evolutionary algorithms (EAs) in handling small datasets with elevated precision and reduced computational complexity. Traditional CAD models face limitations as they can only be developed post‐outbreak, relying on datasets that become available during such events such as the COVID‐19 pandemic. The scarcity of data for emerging diseases poses a substantial challenge to achieving elevated precision with conventional deep‐learning algorithms. Furthermore, even when datasets are available, employing deep learning for class‐based classification is arduous, necessitating model retraining, in this paper, we propose a novel hybrid algorithm that leverages the strengths of the crow search algorithm (CSA) and the spider monkey optimization (SMO) algorithm to create an optimised spider monkey crow search (OSM‐CS) algorithm. We developed a CAD tool that maps each input CT image to a high‐dimensional vector by extracting four categories of features: high contrast, polynomial decomposition, textural, and pixel statistics. The proposed OSM‐CS algorithm is employed as a feature selection method. Our experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the OSM‐CS algorithm, achieving an impressive accuracy of 98.2% when coupled with an AdaBoost classifier for multi‐class classification and 99.93% for binary classification. This performance surpasses that of state‐of‐the‐art (SOTA) deep learning models and recently published hybrid algorithms, underscoring the potential of the OSM‐CS algorithm as a powerful tool in the realm of CAD.