System and method for reducing artifact bloom in a reconstructed object

1. A system for reducing artifact bloom in a reconstructed image of an object, the system comprising:

an imaging device operative to obtain one or more slices of the object; and

a controller in electronic communication with the imaging device and operative to:

determine an intensity threshold based at least in part on the contrast medium enhancement and a global noise value across the one or more slices;

identify one or more regions within the reconstructed image by:

determining a noise value for each of the one or more slices;

generating a reduced noise slice for each of the one or more slices based at least in part of the noise value of the respective slice;

identifying one or more connected regions within each of the reduced noise slices; and

selecting, as the identified one or more regions, one or more of the connected regions having peak intensities that exceed the intensity threshold;

generate the reconstructed image based at least in part on the one or more slices; and

de-bloom the identified one or more regions within the reconstructed image based at least in part on a contrast medium enhancement across at least part of a volume of the object.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further operative to de-bloom the one or more regions based at least in part on a point-spread-function.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further operative to de-bloom the one or more regions based at least in part on an anti-diffusion operation.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein each of the selected one or more connected regions has a peak intensity that exceeds the intensity threshold by a predetermined amount.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein each of the connected regions has an area larger than a pre-defined threshold.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further operative to de-bloom the one or more regions by locally de-blooming one or more sub-regions within each of the one or more regions, each of the one or more sub-regions having a peak intensity that exceeds the intensity threshold.

7. A method for reducing artifact bloom in a reconstructed image of an object, the method comprising:

determining an intensity threshold based at least in part on a contrast medium enhancement across at least part of a volume of the object and a global noise value across one or more slices, wherein the reconstructed image is based at least in part on the one or more slices;

identifying one or more regions within the reconstructed image by:

determining a noise value for each of the one or more slices;

generating a reduced noise slice for each of the one or more slices based at least in part of the noise value of the respective slice;

identifying one or more connected regions within each of the reduced noise slices; and

selecting, as the identified one or more regions, one or more of the connected regions having peak intensities that exceed the intensity threshold; and

de-blooming the identified one or more regions.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein de-blooming the one or more regions is based at least in part on a point-spread function.

9. The method of claim 7 , wherein de-blooming the one or more regions is based at least in part on an anti-diffusion operation.

10. The method of claim 7 , wherein each of the selected one or more connected regions has a peak intensity that exceeds the intensity threshold by a predetermined amount.

11. The method of claim 7 , wherein each of the connected regions has an area larger than a pre-defined threshold.

12. The method of claim 7 , wherein de-blooming the one or more regions comprises:

locally de-blooming one or more sub-regions within each of the one or more regions, each of the sub-regions having a peak intensity that exceeds the intensity threshold.

13. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions that adapt a controller to:

determine an intensity threshold based at least in part on a contrast medium enhancement across at least part of a volume of an object in a reconstructed image and a global noise value across the one or more slices, wherein the reconstructed image is based at least in part on the one or more slices;

identify one or more regions within the reconstructed image by:

determining a noise value for each of the one or more slices;

generating a reduced noise slice for each of the one or more slices based at least in part of the noise value of the respective slice;

identifying one or more connected regions within each of the reduced noise slices; and

selecting, as the identified one or more regions, one or more of the connected regions having peak intensities that exceed the intensity threshold; and

de-bloom the identified one or more regions.

14. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 13 , wherein the instructions adapt the controller to de-bloom the one or more regions based at least in part on a point-spread function and an anti-diffusion operation.

15. A controller operative to:

generate a reconstructed image based at least in part on one or more slices of an object obtained by an imaging device;

determine an intensity threshold based at least in part on the contrast medium enhancement and a global noise value across the one or more slices of an object;

identify one or more regions of calcified plaque by within the reconstructed image by:

determining a noise value for each of the one or more slices;

generating a reduced noise slice for each of the one or more slices based at least in part of the noise value of the respective slice;

identifying one or more connected regions within each of the reduced noise slices; and

selecting, as the identified one or more regions of calcified plaque, one or more of the connected regions having peak intensities that exceed the intensity threshold; and

locally de-bloom the identified one or more regions of calcified plaque within the reconstructed image based at least in part on a contrast medium enhancement.