Reconstruction of 3D vertebrae and spinal cord models from CT and STIR-MRI images

In this paper, we propose a system that integrates vertebrae, spinal cord and nerves segmentation results from STIR-MRI and CT images, by estimating the transformation relationship between the segmented vertebra models extracted from these two types of images. Since the segmentation results are already obtained, we build the 3D spinal cord and nerves model. Then we apply a deformable registration algorithm to register the pre-built 3D vertebra models in CT and STIR-MRI. Thus, we apply the local affine transformation to integrate STIR-MRI spinal cord and nerves information with CT vertebrae. This is accomplished by applying a linear interpolation method to achieve the purpose of local affine transformation. In the experimental results, we show the 3D segmentation results of spinal nerve from the STIR-MRI (Short Tau Inversion Recovery - Magnetic Resonance Imaging) images, and also show the integrated 3D spine models from CT and STIR-MRI images.