IIT researchers develop AI-powered technique to diagnose Covid using chest X-ray

The experiment was performed with more than 2,500 chest X-ray images and achieved about 96.80% sensitivity (iStock)Premium
The experiment was performed with more than 2,500 chest X-ray images and achieved about 96.80% sensitivity (iStock)
2 min read . Updated: 28 Jan 2022, 04:56 PM IST Livemint

While there have been numerous research studies in Covid-19 detection using X-ray or CT scans in the past years, most of them fail to provide an explainable solution. The uniqueness of this research is the proposed study which can visually showcase the region which is infected, said the researchers 

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Researchers from IIT Jodhpur have developed a new Artificial Intelligence (AI) solution that can learn abnormalities present in the chest X-ray images to differentiate between a Covid-19 affected lung and a non-Covid affected lung.

The researchers have proposed for the algorithm to be called COMiT-Net.

"The developed AI algorithm not only predicts whether the CXR has Covid-19 pneumonia or not, but it is also capable of identifying the infected regions in the lungs, thus making them explainable," according to a statement by IIT Jodhpur. 

The experiment was performed with more than 2,500 chest X-ray images and achieved about 96.80% sensitivity. The technique interprets only from the lung region.

“While there have been numerous research studies in Covid-19 detection using X-ray or CT scans in the past years, most of them fail to provide an explainable solution. The uniqueness of this research is the proposed study which can visually showcase the region which is infected," read a statement. 

According to IIT Jodhpur, the Artificial Intelligence solution used in this research is explainable from both algorithmic and medical points of view.

The team that contributed to this research are Aakarsh Malhotra, Visiting Research Scholar at IIT Jodhpur, Surbhi Mittal, PhD Scholar, Computer Science, IIT Jodhpur, Puspita Majumdar, Visiting Research Scholar at IIT Jodhpur, Saheb Chhabra, Visiting Research Scholar at IIT Jodhpur, Kartik Thakral, PhD Scholar, Computer Science, IIT Jodhpur, Mayank Vatsa, Professor, Computer Science, IIT Jodhpur, Richa Singh, Professor and Head of Department, Computer Science, IIT Jodhpur, Santanu Chaudhury, Professor and Director, IIT Jodhpur, Ashwin Pudrod, Consultant Pulmonologist, Ashwini Hospital and Ramakant Heart Care Centre, India, Anjali Agrawal, Consultant Radiologist, TeleRadiology Solutions, India.

A research paper on this project has been published in the journal "Pattern Recognition (Volume 122)". The research is part of the RAKSHAK project under NM-CPS DST and iHuB Drishti at IIT Jodhpur. The researchers aim at developing a full-scale prototype through the knowledge learnt in this project. 

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