A Hybrid Multi-Modal Medical Image Fusion Technique using Optimal Sub-band Tree Structuring and Principal Component Analysis

In image processing, "image fusion" is the amalgamation of attributes and requirements from many images into a singular, more comprehensive representation. Multi-modal medical image fusion is a significant category of image fusion. It entails the integration of medical images acquired from several modalities. This work utilizes computed tomography (CT) scans, Positron Emission Tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as modalities. This study (M3IF-SBTS) aims to construct a multi modal medical image approach that combines Optimal Sub-band Tree Structuring (SBTS) and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) with MRI and CT images in a manner that maximizes the information content in the fused image. The SBTS is an advanced wavelet transform version of Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT), where signal is filtered more times. The PCA provides dimensionality reduction and retains the relevant features. The wavelet coefficients are fused using PCA-based fusion method. This combination of SBTS and PCA provides superior results compared to using SBTS, DWT, or PCA as individual methods. This improves overall visual and parametric quality of fusion results than many compared methods.