CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder

Abstract Most existing deep learning‐based multi‐modal medical image fusion (MMIF) methods utilize single‐branch feature extraction strategies to achieve good fusion performance. However, for MMIF tasks, it is thought that this structure cuts off the internal connections between source images, resul...

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Main Authors: Ya Zhu, Xue Wang, Luping Chen, Rencan Nie
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2022-10-01
Series:IET Image Processing
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1049/ipr2.12549
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author Ya Zhu
Xue Wang
Luping Chen
Rencan Nie
author_facet Ya Zhu
Xue Wang
Luping Chen
Rencan Nie
author_sort Ya Zhu
collection DOAJ
description Abstract Most existing deep learning‐based multi‐modal medical image fusion (MMIF) methods utilize single‐branch feature extraction strategies to achieve good fusion performance. However, for MMIF tasks, it is thought that this structure cuts off the internal connections between source images, resulting in information redundancy and degradation of fusion performance. To this end, this paper proposes a novel unsupervised network, termed CEFusion. Different from existing architecture, a cross‐encoder is designed by exploiting the complementary properties between the original image to refine source features through feature interaction and reuse. Furthermore, to force the network to learn complementary information between source images and generate the fused image with high contrast and rich textures, a hybrid loss is proposed consisting of weighted fidelity and gradient losses. Specifically, the weighted fidelity loss can not only force the fusion results to approximate the source images but also effectively preserve the luminance information of the source image through weight estimation, while the gradient loss preserves the texture information of the source image. Experimental results demonstrate the superiority of the method over the state‐of‐the‐art in terms of subjective visual effect and quantitative metrics in various datasets.
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spelling doaj.art-28aada4eb696429c9a9262a573783cd32022-12-22T02:36:27ZengWileyIET Image Processing1751-96591751-96672022-10-0116123177318910.1049/ipr2.12549CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoderYa Zhu0Xue Wang1Luping Chen2Rencan Nie3School of Information Science and Engineering Yunnan University Kunming 650500 ChinaSchool of Information Science and Engineering Yunnan University Kunming 650500 ChinaSchool of Information Science and Engineering Yunnan University Kunming 650500 ChinaSchool of Information Science and Engineering Yunnan University Kunming 650500 ChinaAbstract Most existing deep learning‐based multi‐modal medical image fusion (MMIF) methods utilize single‐branch feature extraction strategies to achieve good fusion performance. However, for MMIF tasks, it is thought that this structure cuts off the internal connections between source images, resulting in information redundancy and degradation of fusion performance. To this end, this paper proposes a novel unsupervised network, termed CEFusion. Different from existing architecture, a cross‐encoder is designed by exploiting the complementary properties between the original image to refine source features through feature interaction and reuse. Furthermore, to force the network to learn complementary information between source images and generate the fused image with high contrast and rich textures, a hybrid loss is proposed consisting of weighted fidelity and gradient losses. Specifically, the weighted fidelity loss can not only force the fusion results to approximate the source images but also effectively preserve the luminance information of the source image through weight estimation, while the gradient loss preserves the texture information of the source image. Experimental results demonstrate the superiority of the method over the state‐of‐the‐art in terms of subjective visual effect and quantitative metrics in various datasets.https://doi.org/10.1049/ipr2.12549
spellingShingle Ya Zhu
Xue Wang
Luping Chen
Rencan Nie
CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
IET Image Processing
title CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
title_full CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
title_fullStr CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
title_full_unstemmed CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
title_short CEFusion: Multi‐Modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
title_sort cefusion multi modal medical image fusion via cross encoder
url https://doi.org/10.1049/ipr2.12549
work_keys_str_mv AT yazhu cefusionmultimodalmedicalimagefusionviacrossencoder
AT xuewang cefusionmultimodalmedicalimagefusionviacrossencoder
AT lupingchen cefusionmultimodalmedicalimagefusionviacrossencoder
AT rencannie cefusionmultimodalmedicalimagefusionviacrossencoder