Differentiable centerline-aware framework for aneurysm neck delineation in volumetric angiography
Accurate morphological characterization of the intracranial aneurysm (IA) neck is fundamental to clinical decision-making and interventional planning. While Three-Dimensional Rotational Angiography serves as the reference standard, automated analysis across volumetric modalities (CTA/MRA) is hindered by topological discontinuities near bifurcations. Existing voxel-wise methods often produce jagged boundaries, compromising metric reliability. To address this, we propose NeckSpline, a differentiable framework treating the neck as a continuous, periodic cubic B-spline. Unlike discrete approaches, it optimizes a closed curve anchored by the parent-vessel centerline, integrating a tightness regularizer and Euler Characteristic (EC) topological loss. Extensive evaluations on MCA-CTA and ADAM-TOF benchmarks demonstrate that NeckSpline achieves superior localization accuracy and clinical non-inferiority, with a neck width Mean Absolute Error (MAE) of 0.44 mm and an angle MAE of 4.6°, significantly outperforming state-of-the-art baselines while maintaining sub-second inference. By guaranteeing topological integrity and sub-voxel precision, the framework offers a robust solution for automated pre-procedural assessment.
Authors
- Xinyan Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0259-1620)
- Shuogui Xu
- Bilin Tao
- Hongyue Zhang
- Jian Zhou
Institutions
- Naval Medical Research Command (US)
- Second Military Medical University (CN)
- Shanghai Changzheng Hospital (CN)
- Changhai Hospital (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- npj Digital Medicine
- Published
- 2026-04-17
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41746-026-02613-6
- Primary Topic
- Intracranial Aneurysms: Treatment and Complications
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Changhai Hospital of Shanghai