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PROPOSING AN EFFICIENT MODEL TO DETECT MELANOMA BASED ON

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International Journal of Soft Computing and Artificial Intelligence, ISSN: 2321-404X, Volume-10, Issue-1, May-2022
http://iraj.in
PROPOSING AN EFFICIENT MODEL TO DETECT MELANOMA
BASED ON DENSE-CNN
1
MOHAMMED Y. ALKHUZAIE, 2ADNAN SAHER MOHAMMED
1,2
Department of computer engineering, Faculty of engineering, Karabuk, University-Karabuk-Turkey
E-mail: 1who224466@gmail.com, 2adnanalajeeli@karabuk.edu.tr

Abstract - Deep learning algorithms provide the best judgment aid for medical experts, potentially improving the
classification of skin lesions and early detection of skin cancer. In manycases, deep learning techniques such as neural
networks have bypassed feature extraction tools. The aim of this study is to design a neural network that has the ability to
accurately and efficiently classify images of skin lesions. In this paper, a dense convolutional neural network (Dense-CNN)
model is designed for melanoma diagnosis. The proposed model was applied to two datasets: the HAM10000 dataset and the
DermQuest-DermIS dataset. These datasets are for images of skin lesions obtained through dermatoscopy. Our results were
compared with those of other studies. The proposed model achieved high diagnostic rates in terms of accuracy, sensitivity,
specificity, and precision when applied to the HAM10000 dataset, reaching 98.03%, 98.05%, 99.67%, and 98.11%,
respectively, while the results when applied to the DermQuest-DermIS dataset reached 97.85%, 97.87%,

Keywords - Melanoma, Dermoscopy, Convolutional Neural Networks, HAM10000, Derm Quest-DermIS.

I. INTRODUCTION which represent malignant and benign of skin lesions.

The primary cause of skin cancer is still a mystery
[1].However, other studies link the disease‟s onset to
factors such as prolonged exposure to bright
sunshine, hormonal and genetic changes in
individuals, and hereditary factor. According to
certain research, people with white skin and colourful
eyes are much more likely than people with darkskin
[2], [3]. Four major medical diagnostic approaches
are used To effectively assess melanoma: the 7-point
checklist, pattern analysis , the Menzies method and
ABCD guidelines. All of these approaches are
considered traditional methods done through human
effort, and they are rather good at detecting skin
cancer, but there may be errors. A high level of
quality is needed to differentiate skin lesions and
obtain more accurate diagnostic results [4]. Because
of the use of conventional feature extraction methods
with very good classifiers, including SVM and ANN,
the CAD technique is more efficient and has
improved results. Because of the changes in the types
of dermatological disorders, the handmade feature
extraction methodology is impracticable for diagnosis
[5]. Feature learning is necessary to overcome the
issue [6], and the usage of image analysis and AI
vision for various medical image analysis has
increased dramatically in the last decade [7]. Deep
learning and machine learning are two of the most
essential approaches and methodologies for
diagnosing diseases from medical imaging in the
medical field. The use of these technologies speeds
up the diagnosis process while lowering human error.
It can also increase the accuracy and tolerability of
dermatologists‟ and doctors‟ skin cancer assessments.
In the field of diagnosing images of skin lesions, the
work of artificial intelligence networks is mainly
focused on dividing images into two categories:
malignant and benign. Figure (1) shows some images
In the past years, several deep learning approaches
have been proposed. While it was limited to
dermatoscopy, it did not prove its competence to
obtain accurate results when applied to various
datasets. To deal with the problem, we proposed
designing a pre-trained. Dense-CNN network,
capable of handling various datasets for skin lesions
to obtain very accurate diagnostic results.
Figure 1: Some of images used in datasets
II. RELATED WORKS
This section summarizes and describes relevant
studies on picture categorization and differentiation
that have been done. This is accomplished with a
particular emphasis on new studies that used deep
learning approaches to diagnose and classify photos
of skin lesions. The need for meticulous classification
demarcation of skin lesions has been highlighted, as it
can aid and support the clinician in the identification
process and assessment, as well as define the kind of
lesion. Although all the results that we will observe in
these studies will appear rather good, they cannot be
compared with the results of our current study. The
reason for this is that all previous studies have used a
maximum of one or two datasets, while we have used
eight datasets and applied our proposed model. In a
study presented by Zhang, Ni et al. [2], they used a
CNN neural network with a whale optimization
algorithm in their investigation. They employed two

Proposing an Efficient Model to Detect Melanoma Based on Dense-CNN

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International Journal of Soft Computing and Artificial Intelligence, ISSN: 2321-404X,
http://iraj.in
datasets for this method: DermQuest and DermIS,
which had over 22,000 dermatoscopy images of skin
disorders. When this method was compared to
datasets generated in other ways, it came out on top.
When compared to the other methods, the proposed
strategy outperformed them all. Albahar, Marwan Ali
[8]recommended developing a novel prediction
model and extracting features using the CNN-Novel
Regulaizer model. Skin lesions were split into two
categories using the ISIC data collection. The first is
benign carcinomas, while the second is malignant
carcinomas. AUC-ROC prediction accuracy was
97.49%, a sensitivity of 94.3%, and a specificity of
93.6%. Lopez, Adria Romero et al. [9] they suggested
to develop VGGNet, a sort of convolutional neural
network, for classification and feature extraction
using 1279 photos from the ISIC archive dataset.
Based on transfer learning, network training, and
maintaining a learning model, three classification
algorithms were applied. The model was used in three
different ways, with the third strategy yielding the
best results. The sensitivity reached was 78.66%
SertanKaymak et al. [10] trained the ISIC 2018
dataset using the AlexNet classifier. To discover
features and classify the photos, this diagnosis
required visual identification of the skin mass.
Depending on how the dataset was partitioned, three
models were developed and trained. The second
model was able to distinguish between benign and
malignant melanoma with greater precision, with an
accuracy of 84.4%, a sensitivity of 84.7%, and a
specificity of 83.8%. specificity.
III. MATERIALS AND METHODS
A. Datasets
Two datasets were used, which to our knowledge is
the most data used in providing images of skin
lesions in medical and research centers. Most of these
types of data are freely available on the Internet, and
some of them require certain subscriptions for the
purpose of obtaining them. The datasets used in this
research contained seven categories of skin lesions,
and some of these data contained 21 sub-categories.
Each dataset contains a number of images obtained
by the dermatoscopy method.
The common factor in dividing this data is that it
contains two main categories: benign and melanoma.
HAM10000 datasets have selected all the image data
in them, which contained 10015 images, while
DermIS-DermQuest dataset contained 6600 images.
All images in the eight datasets were distributed as
75To facilitate the classification process, each
category of skin lesions is encoded with a special
symbol, as shown here: „nv‟= „melanoma nevi‟ ,
„mel‟ = „melanoma‟, „bkl‟ = „benign keratosis-like
lesions‟ , „bcc‟ = „maligna melanoma‟ , „vac‟=
Proposing an Efficient Model to Detect Melanoma Based on Dense-CNN
71
Volume-10, Issue-1, May-2022
„pyogenic granulomas and hemorrage‟ , „akiec‟ =
„Actinic Keratoses and interaepithelial carcinoma‟ ,
„df‟ = „dermatofibroma‟.
Table 1 Show the distribution of images based on the type of
dataset, and allocation of images on training-testing and
validation (before balanced).
1) Data preparation: All datasets were subjected to
standardization and scale data preparation. To acquire
the very same set of input variables, RGB
dermatoscopy photos were standardized to [0, 1]. The
normalizing procedure ensures that the image pixels
are equal and that the resolution is stable. Due to
discrepancies in the sliced skin lesions in the
diagnostic imaging scans, the information for the
dermatological lesion isolation process was reduced
to 28 x 28 pixels using the np.array. Because of
variances in the sizes of the supplied photographs, all
images collected by this method have indeed been
scaled.
2) Preprocessing: It is a technique for removing
noise and blemishes from images, visually
superfluous data. Additional preprocessing
procedures could include a spatial reduction and
locating regions of the image for more processing.
Light and noise impacts are common in skin surface
images when taken with expert image sensors, so
they must be removed [11], [12].These effects
include non uniform lighting and light-reflective
surfaces on the surface of the skin. To minimize the
impact of these variables on CNN classification, first
lighting is used. On the input images, the adjustment
step is carried out. At this stage, it detects lighting
impacts as sharp changes in the absorption and
valuation streams for the color space. As a result,
with a particular set of contours, the lighting impacts
are overlooked. This is done without trying to destroy
the initial image‟s actual factual edges.
3) Data augmentation: To acquire successful
outcomes from processing vast volumes of data,
neural networks require great practice [13]. The
arrangement of images used in learning may be
inadequate or imbalanced. Reproduction is carried
out in the dataset in order to enhance the rate of
incomplete evidence used in learning. Photo
augmentation is a breeze with Keras‟ built-in
libraries. Additional data for the training dataset is
generated via the data replication method. It‟s done in
a variety of ways, including rotating, scaling,
translating to the main image, and mixing these
techniques[13], [14]. In this study, we use a rotation
International Journal of Soft Computing and Artificial Intelligence, ISSN: 2321-404X,
http://iraj.in
angle variety that is random within the spectrum of
[0, particular angle. Each of the trained dermatoscopy
images in each of the eight datasets was rotated four
times at 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° angles. Figure (2)
illustrates the effect of data augmentation. By
improving the data, we boosted the pictures of the
basic training set in all of the datasets utilized here.
The increment in the quantity of photos in the
datasets is detailed in table (2). To train the model,
we divided the enhanced dataset into a training
dataset and a validation dataset with a ratio of 0.8:0.2,
respectively.
Figure 2: Example of melanoma Images after data
augmentation.
TABLE 2 Information on comprehensive data enhancement
B. Proposed System
1) Convolutional neural network: A sort of
convolutional neural network (CNN) that is supposed
to work similarly to human vision. They‟re mostly
utilized in deep learning image recognition
technologies that aggregate diverging or comparable
images into representations that may be used to
classify items in images and videos, including faces,
individuals, or individuals with images in medical
imaging [13].
A CNN is made up of several layers, each of which
receives the output from the previous layer. The first
layer‟s job is to recognize unprocessed features in
images, including horizontal, vertical, and diagonally-
bordered images. The following layer picks out more
complicated elements like angles or shapes formed by
collecting edges. The procedure of detecting high-
level characteristics such as objects, faces, and other
features starts as you advance from one layer to the
next. In a CNN design, there are numerous
convolution layers, a series of pooling layers, and
then contrasting normalizing layers. That there‟s at
least one fully connected layer at the finish.CNN is
much less compact than a feed-forward network and
therefore easier to train. On elevated images,
nevertheless, the greatest result of CNNs is
marginally lower and much more computationally
expensive than the feed line [11],[13],[14].
Proposing an Efficient Model to Detect Melanoma Based on Dense-CNN
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Volume-10, Issue-1, May-2022
2) Implementation: This section will detail the steps
for creating the proposed architecture, including a
mention of the libraries on which the architecture is
based. We will support building architecture with
diagrams, tables, and illustrations with an explanation
of the functions used in the proposed model. In order
to classify melanoma as malignant or benign, the
model of Dense-convolutional neural network (CNN)
architecture was established. The architecture consists
of four basic layers: the Conv2D layer, MaxPool2D
layer, the flattening layer, and the dense layer.
Function layers consist of two layers, namely the
Relu layer and the softmax layer. After processing the
images that consist of (preprocessing, segmentation,
feature extraction, and ckassification), as shown in
figure (3). Building and organizing the basic layers
was the first phase, followed by testing the series of
training steps, activation functions, and ultimately
introducing the optimizer to the model. To test how
data augmentation affects prediction accuracy,
Adam‟s optimizer was utilized. When we compared
the effectiveness of the algorithm to earlier work on
the same model, we discovered that Adam‟s
optimizer is a better data optimizer than others. The
activation functions will return a maximum value of
(0, x). It will just return x if the relationship between
x and 0 is higher than 0. This function returns 0 if it is
not called. A hyperparameter is the magnitude of the
zero padding. When filters are applied to an input
matrix, the resulting volume‟s spatial size shrinks.
The size of the output produced will shrink when
more convolutional layers are applied. However, in
order to obtain low-level characteristics from the
margins of images, sometimes it is preferable to keep
as much data from the source input matrix as
possible. As a result, the output volume emphasizes is
frequently kept the same as the input volume. Zero
padding is a feature that allows you to customize the
output volume‟s spatial size. To achieve this, it pads
the input space with zeros all around the boundary
[15]. The proposed model for the diagnosis of skin
cancer is shown in figure (4).
International Journal of Soft Computing and Artificial Intelligence, ISSN: 2321-404X, Volume-10, Issue-1, May-2022
http://iraj.in

Figure 4: proposed model for detection of melanoma

IV. RESULTS Figure 5: Shows the testing-training accuracy for (A): HAM
10000 dataset, (B): DermIS-DermQuest dataset.

In this section, the measurement of accounts using the

confusion matrix application, which has four
indicators, is presented. True positive (TP), false
positive (FP), false negative (FN), and true negative
(TN) values are assigned to the indices. By applying
the mentioned equations, we were able to derive the
final values of the classification. Table No. (3) shows
all the equations that were used with a simplified
definition. The results of all datasets were represented
by four plots (confusion matrix, training test Figure 6: Shows the testing-training loss for (A): HAM 10000
accuracy, loss accuracy, and ROC). The results of dataset, (B): DermIS-DermQuest dataset
applying the proposed model and its implementation
were presented on eight datasets, as shown in table
(4). We divided the dataset into 75% for training, 5%
for validation, and 20% for testing. The results for
accuracy,specificity, sensitivity, accuracy, and
receiver operational characteristics (ROC) were
presented with a 7 × 7 noise matrix for each dataset.

After testing the Dense-CNN model on the eight

datasets, we got the following: Figure (6) represents
the plotted results for testing-training accuracy.
Figure (7) represents the plotted results for testing-
training loss. Figure (8) represents the confusion
matrix for datasets used.

TABLE 3 The performance measures that were employed in

this work, together with their description

Fig. 7. Figure 7. Figure 7. Shows the confusion matrix for the

datasets used. (A): HAM 10000, (B): DermIS-DermQuest

V. DISCUSSION

Firstly, we review the results obtained by applying

TABLE 4 Shows the results of accuracy(Acc), sensitivity(Sen),
specificity(Spe), precision (Pre) and AUC for all datasets used
the model to two datasets (HAM10000 and
according to apply proposed model DermISDermQuest). Secondly, we compare our
Proposing an Efficient Model to Detect Melanoma Based on Dense-CNN

73
International Journal of Soft Computing and Artificial Intelligence, ISSN: 2321-404X, Volume-10, Issue-1, May-2022
http://iraj.in
findings to those of related studies that dealt with a
skin cancer diagnosis by applying them to a variety of
models on a variety of datasets. Here we are trying to
focus mainly on the studies that dealt with the
implementation of neural networks in all their
models. We believe that a comparison of the CNN
results used in previous studies and our own, Dense-
CNN, will give more reliable results. Through the
results, it is clear to us that our model has achieved
results of accuracy, specificity, sensitivity, precision,
and AUC much better than the results of previous
studies. The experimental results of the proposed TABLE 6 The comparison of results with studies that used the
DERMQUEST-DERMIS dataset
model showed that the accuracy of the model was
98.03% when our model was applied to the HAM
VI. CONCLUSION
10000 dataset, while the highest accuracy score
achieved by previous studies by reviewing four
A new improved technique for identifying melanoma
studies when applied to the same dataset was 97.78%.
from the input images is proposed in this work. A
convolutional neural network was used to create the
The experimental results of the proposed model
approach. A dense layer algorithm is used to enhance
showed that the accuracy of the model was 97.85%
the efficiency of CNN. To eliminate errors in the
when our model was applied to the DermQuest-
actual network outputs, the efficient algorithm used to
DermIS dataset, while the highest accuracy score
select the optimal weights and biases in the network
achieved by previous studies by reviewing four
is applied. With thorough study and deep data
studies when applied to the same dataset was 96.3%.
comprehension, the proposed technique was
The reason for the good results that we got, we
successful in detecting and predicting melanoma with
believe, is due to several factors: 1- The designed
good outcomes. We put the proposed method through
model‟s strength, as it contains several layers of
its paces on two datasets (HAM10000 and DermIS-
con2D 2- The presence of three dense layers with the
DermQuest). The results we obtained indicate that the
activation functions RELU and Softmax.3-The
proposed technique achieved the highest accuracy of
Adam‟s optimizer was utilized. 4-Not using the
98.03% when applied to the HAM10000 dataset. The
transfer learning method because we have created and
results obtained were compared with those of
trained the model.
previous investigations, with accuracy, specificity,
sensitivity, precision, and AUC serving as measures
This is knowing that the number of epochs is 50,
of performance. The final results showed that the
which acts to train the data. In addition, we tried as
application of the proposed model has achieved the
much as possible to use datasets containing large
best results in diagnosing skin cancer, and this
numbers of skin lesions image data. The use of big
accuracy has outperformed all the results of previous
data allows us to get good results so that we can make
studies that compared it with it. For future work, we
comparisons with other results. The tables (5 and 6)
suggest dividing the major skin lesions into several
represent the results of all the comparisons we made
subcategories to ensure the best classification of skin
with other related work results.
lesions.

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