A deep look into radiomics

Abstract

Radiomics is a process that allows the extraction and analysis of quantitative data from medical images. It is an evolving field of research with many potential applications in medical imaging. The purpose of this review is to offer a deep look into radiomics, from the basis, deeply discussed from a technical point of view, through the main applications, to the challenges that have to be addressed to translate this process in clinical practice. A detailed description of the main techniques used in the various steps of radiomics workflow, which includes image acquisition, reconstruction, pre-processing, segmentation, features extraction and analysis, is here proposed, as well as an overview of the main promising results achieved in various applications, focusing on the limitations and possible solutions for clinical implementation. Only an in-depth and comprehensive description of current methods and applications can suggest the potential power of radiomics in fostering precision medicine and thus the care of patients, especially in cancer detection, diagnosis, prognosis and treatment evaluation.

Keywords: Features; Imaging biomarkers; Medical imaging; Personalized medicine; Radiomics.

Fig. 1

Radiomics workflow: The subsequent steps required in the radiomics process to extract radiomics features in clinical settings

Fig. 2

Examples of specific matrices allocating the information on the spatial distribution of pixel values in the image: (a) Gray Level Co-occurrence Matrix (GLCM), (b) Gray Level Run Length Matrix (GLRLM), (c) Gray Level Size Zone Matrix (GLSZM), (d) Neighboring Gray Tone Difference Matrix (NGTDM)