Small object detection using morphological filtering and multiresolution analysis with application to microcalcification detection in mammograms

In this paper, we propose a Laplacian matched filter based approach for small object detection using gray scale morphological filtering combined with wavelet-based multiresolution analysis. This multiresolution matched filter based detection includes two stages: prewhitening processing and matched filter detection fusion. The gray scale morphological filters are used as prewhitening filters. The wavelet transform relates directly the Laplacian matched filters with multiresolution analysis. Preliminary tests of a small object detection on simulated narrow band clutter and microcalcification detection from mammographic images show that the proposed approach is capable of a tool for small object detection without explicit assumptions about image background and noise statistics. A general form for whitening filtering and adaptive thresholding unified as the local operation transformation (LOT) is also presented.