arXiv:2601.13236eess.IVcs.AI2026-01

为加速MRI重建提供像素级不确定性评估,无需真实参考图像即可识别不可靠区域。

Pixelwise Uncertainty Quantification of Accelerated MRI Reconstruction

  • 结合共形分位数回归与变分网络,实现像素级不确定性区间估计
  • 在4倍及以上加速下,预测不确定性与真实误差相关性超90%
  • 适用于临床中无真值图像时的重建质量自评估,支持动态扫描优化

并行成像技术可缩短磁共振成像(MRI)扫描时间,但加速因子提高会导致图像质量下降。临床上通常采用保守的加速因子,因为缺乏自动评估欠采样重建诊断质量的机制。本文提出一种通用框架,实现并行MRI重建中的像素级不确定性量化,可在无任何真值参考图像的情况下自动识别不可靠区域。方法将共形分位数回归与图像重建相结合,估计统计上严格的像素级不确定性区间。在fastMRI数据集的笛卡尔欠采样脑部和膝关节数据上,使用2至10倍加速因子进行训练与评估。采用端到端变分网络进行图像重建。定量实验表明,预测不确定性图与真实重建误差高度一致:在4倍及以上加速下,皮尔逊相关系数高于90%;而使用简单残差幅值的启发式方法时,相关性低于70%。定性结果显示,基于分位数回归的不确定性图能准确捕捉不同加速因子下的误差大小与空间分布,高不确定性区域与病灶及伪影位置一致。该框架使无需真值图像即可评估重建质量成为可能,是迈向自适应MRI采集协议的重要一步。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Parallel imaging techniques reduce magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan time but image quality degrades as the acceleration factor increases. In clinical practice, conservative acceleration factors are chosen because no mechanism exists to automatically assess the diagnostic quality of undersampled reconstructions. This work introduces a general framework for pixel-wise uncertainty quantification in parallel MRI reconstructions, enabling automatic identification of unreliable regions without access to any ground-truth reference image. Our method integrates conformal quantile regression with image reconstruction methods to estimate statistically rigorous pixel-wise uncertainty intervals. We trained and evaluated our model on Cartesian undersampled brain and knee data obtained from the fastMRI dataset using acceleration factors ranging from 2 to 10. An end-to-end Variational Network was used for image reconstruction. Quantitative experiments demonstrate strong agreement between predicted uncertainty maps and true reconstruction error. Using our method, the corresponding Pearson correlation coefficient was higher than 90% at acceleration levels at and above four-fold; whereas it dropped to less than 70% when the uncertainty was computed using a simpler a heuristic notion (magnitude of the residual). Qualitative examples further show the uncertainty maps based on quantile regression capture the magnitude and spatial distribution of reconstruction errors across acceleration factors, with regions of elevated uncertainty aligning with pathologies and artifacts. The proposed framework enables evaluation of reconstruction quality without access to fully-sampled ground-truth reference images. It represents a step toward adaptive MRI acquisition protocols that may be able to dynamically balance scan time and diagnostic reliability.

MRI重建不确定性量化医学影像

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