Three-dimensional surface reconstruction of human bone using a BB-spline based interpolation approach

An effective method for the 3D Bio-CAD model reconstruction of human bone from a scanned point cloud data or a sequence of CT image data is presented based on a BB-spline interpolation scheme. In the method, a base surface is generated by creating a smooth implicit surface from the given point cloud data or a sequence of CT image data. The implicit surface is defined by a combination of the well-known thin plate radial basis functions (RBFs) using the domain decomposition method (DDM). After generating the base implicit surface, various types of CAD models such as surface and solid are constructed by using the base implicit surface. In order to reconstruct a complex model, voxel data which can be extracted easily from the base implicit surface are used to generate a rectangular curve net with good quality using the projection and smoothing scheme. After generating the interior points and tangential vectors in each rectangular region considering the required accuracy, a complex BB-spline surface is reconstructed by interpolating the rectangular array of points. Experimental results show that the proposed method creates the three dimensional shapes of human bones suitable for bone scaffold design, finite element analysis, and medical diagnosis.

Graphical abstractFigure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slideHighlights► Efficient generation of a base implicit surface based on thin-plate RBFs. ► Generating a good quality of rectangular curve net with C1C1 continuity. ► Reconstructing a BB-spline surface of arbitrarily irregular and complex model. ► Complex human spine bone model reconstruction from a sequence of CT image data. ► An efficient projection and smoothing algorithm.