Segmentation of tumors from endoscopic images
using topological derivatives based on discrete
approach
Ravindra S. Hegadi*
*
Department of Computer Science, Karnatak University
Dharwad – 580003, India.
1
ravindrahegadi@rediffmail.com
Abstract— The growth and development of interdisciplinary
research areas in the recent years has motivated the researchers
in the area of image processing to apply the techniques from the
Physics and Mathematics extensively in developing efficient
image processing algorithms. One such application is use of
topological derivatives for image segmentation. In this paper the
cancer tumors from endoscopic images are segmented using the
topological derivatives based on discrete approach. The
topological derivatives quantify the sensitivity of a problem when
the image domain is perturbed by the introduction of
heterogeneity such as hole, inclusion, source term, etc. The
topological derivatives are used here as a descent direction to
minimize the associated cost function. The segmentation results
based on the proposed methodology are very encouraging..
Keywords— Topological derivatives, segmentation, endoscopy,
tumor
I. INTRODUCTION
The endoscope has revolutionized the field of
gastroenterology. Through the endoscopy physician can
directly examine almost any part of the intestinal tract.
Biopsies can be obtained, polyps removed and clear images
obtained. This gallery of endoscopy images provides views of
the GI tract from top to bottom. The gallery is separated into
the various organs within the abdomen-esophagus, stomach,
colon, etc. Gastrointestinal endoscopy has been significantly
improved during the last decade. Tumors of less than 5 mm in
diameter can now be detected by using high-resolution video
endoscopes. Additional in vivo staining allows better
delineation and more precise identification of the lateral
spreading of lesions. Today the missing of cancers in early
stage is mainly due to lack of screening programs rather than
technical limitations. Endoscopic mucosal resection of
superficial lesions is primarily a diagnostic procedure to
determine the need for surgery [1].
Many contributions have been made to this area of medical
image segmentation since the introduction of the Mumford
and Shah functional [3]. Moreover, the inherent complexity of
this issue has motivated interdisciplinary research and the use
of techniques actually born in other areas into image
processing and medical imaging. Classical image
segmentation techniques are based on two basic pixel
characteristics: discontinuities and similarities. Many of these
classical techniques (e.g., multiple thresholds, region growing,
c
978-1-4244-8594-9/10/$26.00 2010 IEEE
morphological filtering and others [4], [5]) have been applied
to try to solve this problem with variable outcomes [6], [7].
Such techniques tend to be unreliable when segmenting a
structure which is surrounded by others with similar image
intensity (e.g., low-contrast structures). More sophisticated
techniques, like Level Sets, use powerful numerical
computations for tracking the evolution of moving surface
fronts. These techniques are based on computing
linear/nonlinear hyperbolic equation solutions for the
appropriate equations of motion. An initial approximation of
the solution (seed) evolves until it gets the limits of the region
of interest.
A Segmentation method based on active contour without
edges is proposed by Dhandra and Ravindra Hegadi [2] in
which an endoscopic image is classified as normal or
abnormal based on number of regions generated in the image
after segmentation. Since Active Contours is the most
successful variational model, it has been used extensively in
Medical Image Analysis [8]. Many of its extensions have also
contributed to the analysis of medical images. But, the only
drawback of this model is the existence of local minima in the
active contour energy, which makes the initial guess critical to
get satisfactory results.
In this paper the input endoscopic images are segmented
using the discrete image segmentation algorithm based on
topological derivatives proposed by I. Larrabide [9]. Section 2
presents the formulation of the segmentation problem and the
cost functional associated to a specific segmentation of the
image data. The topological derivative of this cost functional
using the Topological-Shape Sensitivity Method [10], [11] is
calculated and the proposed segmentation algorithm and
numerical approximation used to find an approximated
solution of the associated variational problem will be
presented in this Section. In Section 3 segmentation results
using the proposed method for endoscopic images are
presented.
II. IMAGE SEGMENTATION BASED ON TOPOLOGICAL
DERIVATIVES
The introduction of the Topological Derivative originally
conceived for the study of topology optimization problems. It
has shown interesting results when applied to image
processing [12], [13]. The topological derivative is computed
for an appropriate functional associated to the image
54
indicating the cost endowed to a specific image segmentation.
Further, an image segmentation algorithm based on this
derivative is proposed.
Fig,1 Topologicalderivativeconcept
Roughly speaking, let (ȍ) = (ij(ȍ)) be the cost
function to be minimized and ij(ȍ) the solution of an
associated variational problem (VP) defined in the domain ȍ.
For a small parameter ‫ • ׫‬0, let ȍ‫ ׫‬be the perturbed domain
obtained by the insertion of heterogeneity on the parameters
governing the associated VP. This heterogeneity is defined in
a small sphere of radius ‫ ׫‬cantered at any point X̂ of the
domain ȍ. Furthermore, let ij‫ ׫‬be the solution of the VP
defined in the perturbed domain ȍ‫( ׫‬see Figure 1). Then, for
small values of parameter ‫ ׫‬the topological sensitivity
provides an asymptotic expansion of (ȍ‫)׫‬:
(ȍ‫= )׫‬ (ȍ) + f(‫  )׫‬DT ( Xˆ )  o( f (‫))׫‬
where f (‫ )׫‬is a known positive function going
monotonically to zero with ‫ ׫‬and DT ( Xˆ ) is the topological
derivative. Therefore, this derivative can be seen as a first
order correction on (ȍ) to estimate (ȍ‫)׫‬. Since f (‫ )׫‬is
positive, the heterogeneity must be introduced at any point X̂
where DT is negative in order to reduce the value of the cost
where Nc is the number of predefined classes in which the
original image v will be segmented and ci represents the
intensity that characterizes the ith í class.
Therefore, the image segmentation problem can be stated as
following: Given the image data v  V find the segmented
image u *  U such that minimizes a functional :ܷհԹ
endowed to the cost of a specific segmented image and being
U defined as:
U = {u V : u(x) C, x‫ א‬ȍ } (4)
Motivated by the Mumford and Shah functional and on our
works on image processing [14], [15], [13], [16], [17] the
following cost functional associated to a segmented image
u U will be adopted:
ଵ ଵ ଶ
(ȍ) =  ‫׬‬ȍ ॶ‫ ߮׏‬ȉ ‫݀߮׏‬ȍ ൅ ‫׬‬ȍ ൫߮ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ‫ݑ‬ሻ൯ ݀ȍ,
ଶ ଶ
(5)
where field ij is solution of the variational problem. Find ij‫א‬
H1(ȍ), such that:
a (ij, Ș) = l (Ș) ‫ א ߟ׊‬H1(ȍ) (6)
with bilinear form a (·,·) : H1(ȍ) × H1(ȍ) ĺ and the linear
form l (·) : L2(ȍ) ĺ respectively defined as:
a (ij, Ș) :=‫׬‬ȍ ॶ‫ ߮׏‬ȉ ‫݀ߟ׏‬ȍ + ‫׬‬ȍ ߮ߟ݀ȍand
(1) l (Ș) := ȕ‫׬‬ȍ ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ‫ݑ‬ሻߟ݀ȍ (7)
Associated to ij, defined the function ij‫ ׫‬which is solution of
a perturbed variational formulation. The perturbation is
characterized by changing the segmented image u with a new
one uT which is identical to u at every point of the domain ȍ
except in the small region B‫ ׫‬centered at point ‫ܠ‬ො ‫ א‬ȍ . In B‫׫‬,
uT assumes one of the values ci C. Formally,

function . As will be shown later, the topological derivative തതതఢ and

uT(x) = u(x) x‫ א‬ȍ̳‫ܤ‬
can be easily obtained and the segmentation method based on uT(x) = ci, ci C x‫ܤ א‬ఢ
this information appears robust even in the presence of very
large noise in the image data. Therefore, the perturbed cost functional becomes:
ଵ
A. Problem Formulation (ȍ‫׬  = )׫‬ȍ ॶ‫߮׏‬ఢ ȉ ‫߮׏‬ఢ ݀ȍ ൅
ଶ
The image data could be characterized by a two- ଶ
ଵ
dimensional matrix of pixels, which are the image elements ଶ ȍ
‫ ׬‬൫߮ఢ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ൯ ݀ȍ, (8)
with certain intensity. Then, the original image data can be
described by a real valued functions v which is constant at where field ij‫ ׫‬is solution of the perturbed variational problem.
image element level, then: Find ij‫ ׫‬H1 (ȍ) such that:
a(ij‫׫‬, Ș) = l‫(׫‬Ș) Ș H1(ȍ) (9)
­°w  L2 (:) : w constant ½°
v V ® ¾ (2) 2
with l‫) (׫‬: L (ȍ) ՜ Թ defined as:
°̄at image element level °¿

where ȍ is an open bounded domain in Թ௡ , n = 2, 3. In l‫( ׫‬Ș) = E ³ v  u T K d: (10)

addition let us define the set of classes C:
C = {ci ‫ א‬Թ : i = 1, · · · ,Nc},
:
B. Numerical solution of topological derivatives
(3)
The topological derivative allows us to quantify the
sensitivity of the problem when the domain under
consideration ȍ is perturbed by introducing a hole, an

2010 International Conference on Signal and Image Processing 55

inclusion or a source term in a small region B‫ ׫‬which is ball of
radius ‫׫‬. According to [17] the numerical solution of
topological derivatives is:
ଵ
DT ሺ‫ܠ‬ොሻ ൌ ሺܿ௜ െ ‫ݑ‬ሻൣ൫߮ሺ‫ܠ‬ොሻ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ‫ݑ‬ሻ൯ ൅ ൫߮ሺ‫ܠ‬ොሻ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ܿ௜ ሻ൯ ൅
ଶ
ʹሺͳ െ ߚሻ߮ሺ‫ܠ‬ොሻ൧‫ܠ׊‬ො ‫ א‬ષ
(11)
From the above result the topological derivative at any
point ‫ܠ‬ො ‫ א‬ષ only depends on the value at that point of the
function ij solution of the variational problem given by Eq. (6)
defined in the non perturbed domain ȍ on the image data v, on
the actual segmented image u and on the perturbation given by
one of the intensity values characterizing the Nc classes
ci  C in which the image data v will be segmented.
Moreover, from Eq. (1) and since f (‫ )׫‬is positive, by
introducing a perturbation at any point ‫ܠ‬ො where DT( ‫ܠ‬ො ) is
negative we will obtain a cutback on the cost function value.
Then, DT can be taken as an indicator function defining the
best places where the perturbations could be introduced. This
information is used to for the algorithm for image
segmentation as shown in the next section.
C. Discrete image segmentation algorithm
In this algorithm it is not necessary to compute the field ߮
to obtain topological derivative. In fact, taking ȕ = 0 in Eq.(6)
we obtain the trivial solution ߮ ‫ Ͳ ؠ‬for any segmented image
u U. In this case also the cost functional (ȍ) reduces to a
functional defined in U and given by:
(ȍ) = ‫׬‬π ሺ‫ ݒ‬െ ‫ݑ‬ሻଶ ݀π (12)
Moreover, since v and u are constant at image element level
the above functional can be rewritten as:
ଶ denoted by DT (s) and is given by:
d
(ȍ) =σ௦ሺ‫ ݒ‬௦ െ ‫ ݑ‬௦ ሻ , (13)
where v and u mean the value of v and u at image element ws
s s
ഥ ൌ ‫ڂ‬௦ തതതത
respectively and π ‫ݓ‬௦.
According to this approach, the image segmentation problem
could be reduced to: Given the original image ‫ ܸ א ݒ‬find
‫ ܷ א ݑ‬such that:
ௗ for ‫் ݑ‬௦ = ci, ci ‫ א‬C, i = 1, · · · , Nc.
u* = arg ‹௨‫א‬௎ ሺπሻ (14)
The above minimization problem is easy to be solved. In
fact, it is only necessary to find for each image element s the
index ଓҧ := arg min{|vs í ci|; i = 1, · · · , Nc; ci ‫ א‬C }. Therefore,
the segmented image u* is characterized by‫כݑ‬௦ ൌ ܿపҧ. In other
words and at each image element level s, the segmented image
is obtained taking the value of the class ܿపҧ ‫ ܥ א‬which is closer
to the value vs of the input image v.
In the above formulation there is no control on the measure
of the boundary corresponding to the sub-domain ȍi = {x ‫ א‬ȍ;
u(x) = ci} associated to the class ci ‫ א‬C, i = 1, · · ·, Nc. Then,
in order to obtain a segmented image with more smooth
boundaries and from the ideas behind of the Mumford - Shah
functional [3], the following cost functional is proposed:
ௗ that allow us to select the image element at which the
࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ ൌ ߠ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ ൅ ሺͳ െ ߠሻࣜௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ, with ߠ ‫[ א‬0, 1]‫ ؿ‬Թ
56 2010 International Conference on Signal and Image Processing
(15)
ௗ
where the second term ࣜ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ is associated to the measure of
the interfaces between different regions. In particular, this
functional is taken as:
ଵ
ࣜௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ = σ௦ σ௣ ‫ݔ‬ሺ‫ ݑ‬௦ ǡ ‫ݑ‬௣ ሻ (16)
ସ௡
Here, n = 2 and 3 for two-dimensional and three-dimensional
images respectively and (us, up) is a characteristic function of
the boundary that the image element s shares with the
neighbor image element p and is defined taking the value 1
(one) when us  up and 0 (zero) otherwise. The parameter ߠ
ௗ
controls the contribution of each term ( ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ andࣜௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ) to
ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ.
the cost function ࣠
Then, from de definition of the functional ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ given by
Eq.(15) the cost associated to a segmented image u ‫ א‬U is
easily calculated. Moreover, if we perturb the value of u at a
given image element s by changing its corresponding class
from us to some ci ‫ א‬C we obtain a new perturbed segmented
image uT . Therefore, ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ ் is given by:
ௗ
࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ ൌ ߠ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ ൅ ሺͳ െ ߠሻࣜௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ, (16)
where ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ and ࣜௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ can be written as:
ௗ ௗ
ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ = ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬௦ െ ‫ ݑ‬௦ ሻଶ ൅ ሺ‫ ݒ‬௦ െ ܿ௜ ሻଶ
ଵ
ࣜௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ ൌ ࣜௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ െ σ௣ሾ‫ݔ‬ሺ‫ ݑ‬௦ ǡ ‫ݑ‬௣ ሻ െ ‫ݔ‬ሺܿ௜ ǡ ‫ݑ‬௣ ሻሿ
ସ௡
since uT is equal to u everywhere except at image element
level s where assumes the value ci ‫ א‬C.
From the above expressions, the total variation of the
functional ࣠ ௗ due to a perturbation at image element s will be
DT (s) = ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ െ  ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ, (17)
where
DT (s) = ߠሾሺ‫ ݒ‬௦ െ ‫் ݑ‬௦ ሻଶ െ ሺ‫ ݒ‬௦ െ ‫ ݑ‬௦ ሻଶ ሿ
ଵ
൅ሺͳ െ ߠሻ σ௣ሾ‫ݔ‬ሺ‫் ݑ‬௦ ǡ ‫ݑ‬௣ ሻ െ ‫ݔ‬ሺ‫ ݑ‬௦ ǡ ‫ݑ‬௣ ሻሿ (18)
ସ௡
It is interesting to rewrite the total variation given by
Eq.(17) in the following way:
࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ ் ݑ‬ሻ ൌ ࣠ ௗ ሺ‫ݑ‬ሻ ൅ DT (s), (19)
Then, comparing with Eq. (1) the above expression can be
interpreted as a”topological asymptotic expansion” for this
fully discrete approach. Moreover, at each image element s
the perturbation ‫் ݑ‬௦ could be selected such that produces the
minimum value for the total variation. The minimum value of
the total variation and the corresponding class ci will be
denoted by ‫ܦ‬ ෢் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ and ܿෝప respectively. Then, for this fully
discrete approach the total variation plays the same role than
the topological derivative has in the former section. In fact,
the total variation DT could be taken as an indicator function
perturbation must be introduced in order to reduce the value of
the cost functional.
Using the above considerations a very fast fully discrete
algorithm is proposed. As mentioned before, according to
the”topological asymptotic expansion” (Eq. (19)), for an
image v ‫ א‬V we must find the segmented image u* ‫ א‬U that
minimizes the cost functional ࣠ ௗ by successively choosing
the class that produces the most negative values of the
topological derivative (total variation). With this in mind we
propose the following image segmentation algorithm
(Algorithm 1) named from now on S DT -Discrete.

Algorithm 1 S DT - Discrete an image segmentation

algorithm based on a fully discrete approach
Input: An input image v ‫ א‬V, the set C, an initial guess ‫ܷ א ݑ‬
and the parameters ߠ and ߙ ‫( א‬0, 1).
Output: The segmented image u* ‫ א‬U
normalize the image v and classes values to [0; 1]
while DTMIN < 0 do
෢் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ at each image element s
compute ܿෝప and ‫ܦ‬
evaluate DTMIN = mins{‫ܦ‬ ෢் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ; ‫ܦ‬
෢் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ < 0}
at each image element s make us = ܿෝప if ‫ܦ‬ ෢் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ ൑
ߙ‫்ܦ‬ெூே
end while
u* = u
At this point is interesting to remark that in the two
segmentation algorithms the adopted stop criteria was DTMIN •
0, however others could also be adopted. For example, a
criteria associated to the behavior of the cost functional could
be used, i.e., if in two consecutive iterations the cost function
decreased less than a given tolerance the algorithm stops. Also,
in the two algorithms we use the condition ‫ܦ‬ തതതത் ሺ‫ݏ‬ሻ ” ĮDTMIN to
determine the image elements whose class is to be modified.
Another approach could be adopted, e.g., let L DT be a list of
all image element s with negative topological derivative
ordered by this value, that is:
L DT (N) = {s1, s2, · · · , sN}, (20)

where DT (s1) ” DT (s2) ” · · · ” DT (sN) < 0 and N is the

number of image elements in this list. Then, the new strategy
is to modify the value of the segmented image elements us for
s ‫ א‬L DT (N) belonging to the N first elements of the list L DT
(N).

III. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
The endoscopic images of size 128×128 sq. Pixels,
containing cancerous tumors belonging to the region of
esophagus are obtained for experimentation. The proposed
segmentation algorithm will segment the input image into
three segments of different class of intensities. The term ȡ
which is used to weight both terms in the cost function is set
to 0.85. The percentage of pixels to be reclassified in each
iteration is 0.5.
Fig. 2 Proposed segmentation results (a) Endoscopic colour images,
(b) tumor segmentation using topological derivatives
Figure 2 shows the results of proposed segmentation
method for five endoscopic images containing tumors and
cancer growths. The proposed algorithm could clearly
segment the tumors and abnormal regions in the images
containing tumors with distinct color and shape where as it
could segment vaguely for those images in which there is no
distinct boundary between the tumor and background region.

2010 International Conference on Signal and Image Processing 57

 IV. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper the topological derivative are used as tool for
endoscopic image segmentation to segment possible tumors
and cancerous growths. The topological derivative, originally
conceived for topology optimization problems, has proved to
be useful when applied to image processing.
In particular, image segmentation algorithms based on the
topological derivative associated to an appropriated functional
(indicating the cost endowed to a specific segmentation) were
presented. In this algorithm the segmentation process is driven
by the information obtained with the topological derivative.
In the S DT í Continuous method the solution of a state and
adjoint equation are necessary to be obtained in order to
evaluate the topological derivative. As a counterpart of its
computational cost, the S DT í Continuous appears to be
robust giving good quality segmentations even for high levels
of noise.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work is carried out with the support from the Research
project F. No. 34-104\2008 (SR), University Grant
Commission, Government of India,
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