System and apparatus for real-time processing of medical imaging raw data using cloud computing

1. A system for generating reconstructed images comprising:

a client computing device for generating raw image data for a subject, the raw image data comprising one or more image parameters;

at least one database comprising:

a list of modeling rules for selecting a target computational model based on image parameters included in the raw image data; and

a network address location for each of a plurality of reconstruction systems, each reconstruction system executing at least one different target computational model to generate a reconstructed image data from the raw image data; and

a computation power index associated with each of the reconstruction systems, the computation power index indicating computational capabilities of each reconstruction system;

at least one processor; and

an application comprising modules executable by the at least one processor to:

process received raw image data from the client computing device to identify a target computational model based on the list of modeling rules;

determine a computational load based on image parameters included in the received raw image data;

identify a corresponding network address location for one of the plurality of the reconstruction system executing the target computational model, based on the associated computation power index and the computational load required for reconstructing the raw image data;

transmit the received image data to the corresponding network address location for the reconstruction system associated with a computation power index capable of accommodating the required computation load, to generate reconstructed image data; and

retrieve the reconstructed image data for display.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the client computing device is a magnetic resonance image (MRI) scanner.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the client computing device is a computed tomography (CT) scanner.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the client computing device is an ultrasound scanner.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the identified network address location corresponds to Uniform Resource Locator (URL) address on the Internet.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein the reconstruction system comprises:

a reader to de-serialize the raw image data received from the client computing device;

at least a second processor to execute the target computational model in response to the raw image data and generate the reconstructed image data; and

a writer to serialize the reconstructed image data for transmission to the at least one processor.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein the one or more image parameters specify a two-dimensional image type or a three-dimensional image type.

8. The system of claim 7 wherein the application executable by the at least one processor is further configured to:

transmit the received raw image data to a first corresponding network address location for a first reconstruction system to generate the reconstructed image data when the image parameters specify a two-dimensional image type; and

transmit the received raw image data to a second corresponding network address location for a first reconstruction system to generate the reconstructed image data when the image parameters specify a three-dimensional image type.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the application executable by the at least one processor is further configured to transmit the received raw image data to the corresponding network address location over a communication network selected from one of a group consisting of a wide area network and a local area network.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein the one or more image parameters are selected from the group consisting of a spatial dimension parameter, a time parameter, a flow/velocity parameter, an experiment timing dimension parameter, a diffusion encoding parameter, a functional/physiological testing dimension parameter, and physiologic gating index parameter.

11. An apparatus for processing system raw image data for image reconstruction comprising:

at least one processor; and

a memory comprising:

a list of modeling rules identifying a target computational model based on image parameters included in raw image data; and

a network address location for each of a plurality of reconstruction systems, each reconstruction system executing a different target computational model to generate reconstructed image data from the raw image data;

a computation power index associated with each of the reconstruction systems, the computation power index indicating computation capabilities of each reconstruction system; and

an application comprising modules executable by the at least one processor to control routing of the raw image data to a reconstruction system for processing, the application comprising:

an input module to receive raw image data from an image scanner;

a computation identification module to identify a target computational model based on the list of modeling rules, and to identify a computational load based on image parameters included in the received raw image data;

an address module to identify a corresponding network address location for the reconstruction system executing the target computational model, based on the associated computation power index and the computational load required for reconstructing the raw image data; and

a communication module to:

transmit the received raw image data to the corresponding network address location for the reconstruction system associated with a computation power index capable of accommodating the required computational load, to generate reconstructed image data; and

retrieve the reconstructed image data for display.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the input module receives the raw image data from a magnetic resonance image (MRI) scanner.

13. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the input module receives the raw image data from a computed tomography (CT) scanner.

14. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the input module receives the raw image data from an ultrasound scanner.

15. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the identified network address location correspond to Uniform Resource Locator (URL) address on the Internet.

16. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the reconstruction system comprises:

a reader to de-serialize the raw image data received from the image scanner;

at least a second processor to:

execute the target computational model in response to the raw image data; and

generate the reconstructed image data; and

a writer to serialize the reconstructed image data and transmit transmission to the at least one processor.

17. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the one or more image parameters specify a two-dimensional image type or a three-dimensional image type.

18. The apparatus of claim 17 wherein:

the communication module is further configured to:

transmit the received raw image data to a first corresponding network address location for a first reconstruction system to generate the reconstructed image data when the image parameters specify a two-dimensional image type; and

transmit the received raw image data to a second corresponding network address location for a first reconstruction system to generate the reconstructed image data when the image parameters specify a three-dimensional image type.

19. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the communication module is further configured to transmit the received raw image data to the corresponding network address location over a communication network selected from one of a group consisting of a wide area network and a local area network.

20. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the one or more image parameters are selected from the group consisting of a spatial dimension parameter, a time parameter, a flow/velocity parameter, an experiment timing dimension parameter, a diffusion encoding parameter, a functional/physiological testing dimension parameter, and a physiologic gating index parameter.