Interactive 3D Virtual Colonoscopy System

Abstract

We describle a low-cost 3-D virtual colonoscopy system that is a non-invasive technique to examine the entire colon, and can assist the physicians in detecting polyps inside the colon. Using the helical CT data and proposed techniques, we can 3D reconstruct and visualize the inner surface of the colon. We generate high resolution of video views ofthe colon interior structures as if the viewer's eyes were inside the colon. The pfysicians can virtually navigate insige the colon in two different modes:interactive and automatic navigation, respectively. For the automatic navigation, the flythrough path is determined a priori using the 3D thinning and two-pass tracking schemes. The whole colon is spatially subdivided into several cells, and only potentially visible cells are taken into account during rendering. In comparison with the previous work, the proposed system can efficiently accomplish the required preprocessing tasks, and afford adequate rendering speeds on the low-cost PC system.