Lumbar Spine PCA

Community SlicerSALT
1

Hello! I’m new to Slicer and I need to use Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to get the mean shape of a dataset of L4 vertebrae, I’ve tried using SlicerSALT, and the topology of the files seem to be consistent for Circle/Torus/Mobius Strip. When I run the ShapeAnalysisModule the next error appears:

GenParaMesh standard output:
itk::BinaryMask3DEqualAreaParametricMeshSourceException (00000034D94FDC90)
Location: "Unknown" 
File: D:\D\S\SA-40-build\SPHARM-PDM\Libraries\Shape\Algorithms\BinaryMask3DEqualAreaParametricMeshSource.txx
Line: 183
Description: Warning: Euler equation not satisfied. Euler Number: 25860 - 25860 = 0

Is it related to the topology? Does slicer have other tools that can be used to do the PCA?

2

If you can’t get the SALT to work you can try landmark based approach with SlicerMorph:

  1. Use pseudoLMGenerator to create a large number of surfaceLMs in one of your L4 models. Pay attention to uniformness of the points etc. You probably will need to provide a good model, and then clean some of the redundant points. This will be your template.
  2. use ALPACA to transfer the points on your template (source) model to your individual L4s (you can run in the batch mode).
  3. Use the GPA (Generalized Procrustes Analysis) module to do a superimposition of these landmarks, a PCA decomposition and a mean shape. If scale of the data is important for the mean shape (otherwise it will be in unit size), make sure you check the “enable boaz coordinates” option.

You can tutorials of for all three modules at GitHub - SlicerMorph/Tutorials: SlicerMorph module tutorials.

3

Thank you! If I use the method that you described I need to aligned and center the L4s before?

4

No. Thats taken care of during alpaca