2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)
Segmentation of thermal infrared breast images using
K-Means, FCM and EM algorithms
for breast cancer detection
R.Meena Prakash
Associate Professor, Department of Electronics and
Communication Engineering
V.P.M.M.Engineering College for Women
Krishnankoil, India
meenaprakash73@gmail.com
Abstract— Breast cancer is the most commonly occurring
cancer among women leading to deaths. Detection of tumors at
early stages improves the survival rate. Infrared thermograph
images of breast provide information based on temperature
changes in the breast. This information is more supportive in
detecting cancer at its early stage. In this paper, three
segmentation techniques, K-Means, Fuzzy C- Means (FCM) and
Gaussian Mixture Model - Expectation Maximization (GMM-
EM) are employed to segment the IR breast images and
compared. The method is applied to classify the malignant and
benign cancer tissues.
Index Terms— FCM, EM, K-Means, Colour Segmentation,
breast images.
I. INTRODUCTION
Breast cancer is the second significant cause of death in
women. Early detection of breast cancers decreases the cancer
deaths among women. The most commonly available methods
for detecting the breast cancer include Mammography, Breast
Ultrasound, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Breast
Thermography and Positron Emission Tomography (PET) etc.,
Breast thermography is the non-invasive, non-radiating, fast,
painless and low cost imaging method for early detection of
breast cancer. It is an effective method of imaging for all
women irrespective of ages, sizes and types of breast. The
method is also applicable to monitor the breast condition after
surgery.
The breast thermography uses infrared camera to generate
high resolution images of the temperature changes in the
breast. Precancerous and cancerous masses are highly
proliferating tissues and they need large amount of nutrients.
Hence, they derive new blood vessels which results in increase
in surface temperature. Thermography can detect the indication
of cancer earlier than mammography.
Shahari and Wakankar employed the K-Means
segmentation followed by color analysis for breast cancer
detection in infrared images [1]. Hankare et al performed color
based abnormality separation in thermograph images of breast
using K-Means segmentation [2]. Wakankar and Suresh
proposed automatic diagnosis of breast cancer using color
‹,(((
K. Bhuvaneshwari, M. Divya, K. Jamuna Sri,
A.Sulaiha Begum,
Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering
V.P.M.M.Engineering College for Women
Krishnankoil, India
analysis and Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier [3].
Mahmoudzadeh et al proposed an Extended Hidden Markov
Model for segmentation of breast thermogram [4]. Color
segmentation of breast infrared images using Gaussian Mixture
Model (GMM) where the model parameters are estimated
using Expectation Maximization (EM) algorithm is proposed
[5]. Harrabi and Braiek proposed color image segmentation
based on modified Fuzzy C – Means algorithm and different
color spaces [6]. Two color segmentation techniques, K-Means
and Fuzzy C – Means are modeled and compared for color
segmentation of IR breast images [7]. A thermographic image
analysis method based on Independent Component Analysis
(ICA) for automatic detection of high tumor risk areas is
proposed [8]. Etehadtavakol et al employed bispectral
invariant features for classification of benign and malignant
classes of images [9]. Acharya et al proposed automatic
identification of breast cancer using GLCM feature extraction
from thermograph images [10]. A method of breast cancer
detection in rotational thermography images using texture
features extraction is proposed [11]. A method of segmentation
of thermogram images for the identification of breast cancer
using projection profile approach is proposed [12]. Automated
segmentation and detection methods of breast cancer in
mammograms are proposed [13, 14].
In this paper, segmentation of infrared breast images using
three algorithms, K-Means, Fuzzy C- Means (FCM) and
Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) followed by colour analysis
is proposed to detect breast cancer in its early stage.
II. PROPOSED METHOD
The overview of the proposed method is shown in figure
1. The input infrared breast image in RGB color format is first
converted into L*a*b* color space since the color
segmentation has the advantages of detecting the abnormality
better and determining the extent of malignant cells. In L*a*b*
color space, L* denotes the luminosity layer, a* denotes the
chromaticity layer where the color falls along the red green
axis and b* denotes the chromaticity layer where the color falls
along the blue yellow axis. After color space conversion, three
different segmentation algorithms K-Means, Fuzzy C-Means
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)

and Gaussian Mixture Model – Expectation Maximization Step 4: Repeat steps 2 and 3 till convergence criterion given by
algorithm are applied. The different clusters are labeled and the equation (3) is met.
hottest regions are identified. Based on that, the images are ‖ − −1 ‖ < 0.00001 (3)
classified into benign and malignant classes. where represents the iteration.
C. GMM – EM Algorithm
Input the IR thermal breast image in Given a Gaussian Mixture Model, the likelihood function
RGB format should be maximized with respect to the parameters – Means
and Variances of GMM. The parameters are estimated using
the EM algorithm and the steps are given below.
Convert the color space into Step 1: Initialize the number of classes, means, variances and
L*a*b* space the mixing coefficients.
Step 2: Expectation Step: Compute the posterior probabilities
with the current parameter values using equation 4.
( / ,Σ )
Perform K-Means / Fuzzy C – ( )= (4)
∑ =1 ( / ,Σ )
Means / GMM-EM Segmentation
where (. ) represents the Gaussian Mixture Model.
Step 3: Maximization Step: The parameters – Means, variances
and mixing coefficients are computed using the current
Label the regions into clusters and posterior probabilities using equations (5), (6) and (7)
identify the hottest region respectively.
∑ ( )
= ∑ ( )
(5)
Figure 1 – Proposed Method ∑ − −
Σ = ∑ ( )
(6)
1
A. K-Means Algorithm = ∑ ( ) (7)
The K-Means algorithm segments the input data points Step 4: Evaluate the log likelihood
into K- clusters. The steps in the K-Means algorithm are given ln ( / , Σ, ) = ∑ ∑ =1 ( / ,Σ ) (8)
below. If the convergence criterion is not satisfied, return to step 2.
Step 1: Initialize the number of clusters and the mean values of
the clusters. III. E XPERIMENTAL RESULTS
Step 2: Calculate the distance of the image intensities from the In the proposed work, infrared images of four different
means of all the clusters. cases – one normal case and three cancer cases [15, 16] are
Step 3: Cluster and label the image points based on the segmented and the work is implemented using MATLAB. The
calculated distance. images are segmented using three algorithms – K-Means, FCM
Step 4: Compute the new mean values for each cluster. and GMM-EM.
Step 5: Repeat steps 2, 3 and 4 until the labels of the clusters For FCM and EM segmentation, the color channel a* is
stabilize. considered. In figure 2 and 4, fibrocystic case breast images are
B. Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) Algorithm segmented and the results of K-Means, EM and FCM
segmentation are shown. The hottest regions are indicated in
The FCM segmentation is an unsupervised technique and figures 2 and 4 (d), (h) and (l). Segmentation of normal breast
the steps in the algorithm are given below. image is shown in figure 3 and malignant inflammatory cancer
Step 1: Initialize the number of clusters, cluster centers and case in figure 5.
construct the vector = { 1 , 2 , . . } with all the gray level
intensities of the image.
Step 2: Calculate the membership function for each gray level
intensity as given in equation (1).
1
= 2 (1)
−1
∑ =1

where represents the number of clusters, represents the (a)

degree of fuzziness and represents the distance from the
cluster center.
Step 3: Calculate the new cluster center using equation (2)
∑ =1
= ∑ =1
(2)
(b) (c) (d) (e)
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)

(f) (g) (h) (i)

(j) (k) (l) (m)
Figure 4 – Segmentation of IR thermal breast image –
Fibrocystic changes in left breast
(a) Original image (b)-(e) – Segmentation by K–Means
(j) (k) (l) (m) (f)-(i) – Segmentation by EM (j)-(m) – Segmentation by FCM
Figure 2 – Segmentation of IR thermal breast image –
Fibrocystic Case
(a) Original image (b)-(e) Segmentation by K–Means
(f)-(i) Segmentation by EM (j)-(m) Segmentation by FCM

(a)

(a)

(b) (c) (d) (e)

(b) (c) (d) (d) (f)

(g) (h) (i) (j) (k)

(f) (g) (h) (i)
Figure 5 – Segmentation of IR thermal breast image which
shows cancer case with an increase in heat and blood vessel
activity in left breast when compared to right
(l) (m) (n) (o) (p) (a) – Original image (b)-(i) – Segmentation by K–Means
Figure 3 – Segmentation of IR thermal breast image – Normal The results of implementation of K-Means segmentation of
Case (a) Original image (b)-(f) Segmentation by K–Means IR breast image of cancer case is shown in figure 5 where it
(g)-(k) Segmentation by EM (l)-(p) Segmentation by FCM shows an increase in heat and blood vessel activity in the left
breast when compared to right. The hottest region is indicated
in figure 5 (h). The qualitative analysis indicates that the FCM
segmentation gives good accuracy and indication of the
disease. The drawback of K-Means segmentation is that it
results in empty clusters in certain cases.

(a) IV. CONCLUSION

In this paper, a method to segment the IR breast images
using three segmentation techniques, K-Means, Fuzzy C-
Means (FCM) and Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) –
Expectation Maximization (EM) is implemented. The
conversion of colour space from RGB to L*a*b* is done to
enhance the colour analysis for classification of the images into
(b) (c) (d) (e)
benign and malignant cases.
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