Model prior based reconstruction and data-centric prior reconstruction are two strong paradigms in image reconstruction inverse problems. In this abstract, we propose a framework that integrates the model prior and data-centric multi-scale deep learning priors for reconstructing magnetic resonance images (MRI) from undersampled k-space data. The proposed framework brings together the best of both paradigms and has proven superior to conventional accelerated MRI reconstruction techniques.
The schematic model of our framework is shown in Figure.1. It consists of two important constituents:
I) Multi-scale deep learning network : Kernel size and feature maps of convolution filters in deep convolutional neural networks(CNN)[1,2,5] correspond to feature scales. For example, small kernel filters are known to capture high-frequency features such as edges and details whereas bigger kernel filters capture low-frequency features such as structures in images[5,6]. In MRI, low-frequency components (central k-space) capture anatomical structures and higher frequency components capture edges and details. Motivated by this fact and recent development in multi-grid CNN[6] we divide the undersampled MR input image into two different images:- Low-resolution scale (LRS) and high-resolution scale (HRS) images from corresponding lower and higher frequency components in k-space as shown in Figure.1 and 2. A bigger kernel filter with smaller activation map for LRS and vice-versa for HRS image are used and processed through separate DLN pipeline as shown in Figure.1. For its computational advantage, we use convolution based ResNet[7] as shown in Figure.2. Finally, similarly as in [6], multi-scale features from two different DLNs are treated as two channels and combined through a CNN layer.
II) Unrolling DLN : In [8,9] a framework to learn data regularizer from a deep learning based network is proposed such that the regularizer term in (1) is a function of DL network parameter $$$\theta:\cal{R}(\mathbf{x})\rightarrow \cal{R}(\mathbf{x},\theta)$$$. Then to solve (1) with DL prior $$$\cal{R}(\mathbf{x},\theta)$$$, a FISTA[10] based algortihm is used. Specifically, at each $$$i^{th}$$$iteration in deep learning training phase, a proximal gradient based FISTA algorithm with K=4 iterations is solved with current image estimate $$$\mathbf{x}^k$$$ , current deep learning network parameter $$$\theta^{i}$$$ and data model $$$\phi,\mathbf{y}$$$ to obtain new estimate of an image $$$\mathbf{x}^{k+1}$$$ such that, $$$\Gamma\left(\mathbf{x}^k,\phi, \mathbf{y},\mathbf{\theta}^i\right)\rightarrow \mathbf{x}^{k+1}$$$ as shown in Figure.1. For details of unroll network and $$$\Gamma(\cdot)$$$ please refer to [8].
Data and Implementation: Out of 6400 multi-coil knee data slices 60, 20, and 20 percentage were used as the training, validation, and test respectively. A total of 24 undersampling masks with an acceleration factor of 3, 6, 8 were generated using 2 D random undersampling. Conventional data augmentation techniques such as flipping, rotation, and scaling were used for generalization. Complex image values were handled using separate channels for real and imaginary image components. The framework was implemented on Tensorflow 1.10.1. Adam optimizer with $$$\beta_1=0.99,\beta_2=0.99$$$, and learning rate$$$(\alpha)$$$ of 0.0001 to minimize the $$$\ell_1$$$ norm error of the output compared to the ground truth.
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