All Publications


  • Novel Domain Knowledge-Encoding Algorithm Enables Label-Efficient Deep Learning for Cardiac CT Segmentation to Guide Atrial Fibrillation Treatment in a Pilot Dataset. Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) Ganesan, P., Feng, R., Deb, B., Tjong, F. V., Rogers, A. J., Ruipérez-Campillo, S., Somani, S., Clopton, P., Baykaner, T., Rodrigo, M., Zou, J., Haddad, F., Zaharia, M., Narayan, S. M. 2024; 14 (14)

    Abstract

    Background: Segmenting computed tomography (CT) is crucial in various clinical applications, such as tailoring personalized cardiac ablation for managing cardiac arrhythmias. Automating segmentation through machine learning (ML) is hindered by the necessity for large, labeled training data, which can be challenging to obtain. This article proposes a novel approach for automated, robust labeling using domain knowledge to achieve high-performance segmentation by ML from a small training set. The approach, the domain knowledge-encoding (DOKEN) algorithm, reduces the reliance on large training datasets by encoding cardiac geometry while automatically labeling the training set. The method was validated in a hold-out dataset of CT results from an atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation study. Methods: The DOKEN algorithm parses left atrial (LA) structures, extracts "anatomical knowledge" by leveraging digital LA models (available publicly), and then applies this knowledge to achieve high ML segmentation performance with a small number of training samples. The DOKEN-labeled training set was used to train a nnU-Net deep neural network (DNN) model for segmenting cardiac CT in N = 20 patients. Subsequently, the method was tested in a hold-out set with N = 100 patients (five times larger than training set) who underwent AF ablation. Results: The DOKEN algorithm integrated with the nn-Unet model achieved high segmentation performance with few training samples, with a training to test ratio of 1:5. The Dice score of the DOKEN-enhanced model was 96.7% (IQR: 95.3% to 97.7%), with a median error in surface distance of boundaries of 1.51 mm (IQR: 0.72 to 3.12) and a mean centroid-boundary distance of 1.16 mm (95% CI: -4.57 to 6.89), similar to expert results (r = 0.99; p < 0.001). In digital hearts, the novel DOKEN approach segmented the LA structures with a mean difference for the centroid-boundary distances of -0.27 mm (95% CI: -3.87 to 3.33; r = 0.99; p < 0.0001). Conclusions: The proposed novel domain knowledge-encoding algorithm was able to perform the segmentation of six substructures of the LA, reducing the need for large training data sets. The combination of domain knowledge encoding and a machine learning approach could reduce the dependence of ML on large training datasets and could potentially be applied to AF ablation procedures and extended in the future to other imaging, 3D printing, and data science applications.

    View details for DOI 10.3390/diagnostics14141538

    View details for PubMedID 39061675

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC11276420

  • AUTOMATED, ACCURATE IDENTIFICATION OF VENTRICULAR TACHYCARDIA FROM ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS USING NATURAL LANGUAGE PROCESSING Brennan, K., Azizi, Z., Feng, R., Goyal, J., Liu, X., Ganesan, P., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Baykaner, T., Badhwar, N., John, R. M., Viswanathan, M., Perino, A., Wang, P. J., Rogers, A. J., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2024: 2644
  • Spatially Conserved Spiral Wave Activity During Human Atrial Fibrillation. Circulation. Arrhythmia and electrophysiology Rappel, W. J., Baykaner, T., Zaman, J., Ganesan, P., Rogers, A. J., Narayan, S. M. 2024: e012041

    Abstract

    Atrial fibrillation is the most common cardiac arrhythmia in the world and increases the risk for stroke and morbidity. During atrial fibrillation, the electric activation fronts are no longer coherently propagating through the tissue and, instead, show rotational activity, consistent with spiral wave activation, focal activity, collision, or partial versions of these spatial patterns. An unexplained phenomenon is that although simulations of cardiac models abundantly demonstrate spiral waves, clinical recordings often show only intermittent spiral wave activity.In silico data were generated using simulations in which spiral waves were continuously created and annihilated and in simulations in which a spiral wave was intermittently trapped at a heterogeneity. Clinically, spatio-temporal activation maps were constructed using 60 s recordings from a 64 electrode catheter within the atrium of n=34 patients (n=24 persistent atrial fibrillation). The location of clockwise and counterclockwise rotating spiral waves was quantified and all intervals during which these spiral waves were present were determined. For each interval, the angle of rotation as a function of time was computed and used to determine whether the spiral wave returned in step or changed phase at the start of each interval.In both simulations, spiral waves did not come back in phase and were out of step." In contrast, spiral waves returned in step in the majority (68%; P=0.05) of patients. Thus, the intermittently observed rotational activity in these patients is due to a temporally and spatially conserved spiral wave and not due to ones that are newly created at the onset of each interval.Intermittency of spiral wave activity represents conserved spiral wave activity of long, but interrupted duration or transient spiral activity, in the majority of patients. This finding could have important ramifications for identifying clinically important forms of atrial fibrillation and in guiding treatment.

    View details for DOI 10.1161/CIRCEP.123.012041

    View details for PubMedID 38348685

  • Novel Regional Analysis of Left Atrial Strain From Computed Tomography Separates Patients With Persistent versus Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation Sillett, C., Razeghi, O., Lee, A., Lemus, J., Roney, C., Ganesan, P., Feng, R., Chubb, H., Nieman, K., Rogers, A. J., Rajani, R. LIPPINCOTT WILLIAMS & WILKINS. 2023
  • Separating Patients With Long-Term Success versus Acute Response From Atrial Fibrillation Ablation Using Explainable Machine Learning Ganesan, P., Pedron, M., Feng, R., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Rogers, A. J., Deb, B., Chang, H., Brennan, K. A., Srivastava, V., Clopton, P. L., Narayan, S. M. LIPPINCOTT WILLIAMS & WILKINS. 2023
  • Segmenting computed tomograms for cardiac ablation using machine learning leveraged by domain knowledge encoding. Frontiers in cardiovascular medicine Feng, R., Deb, B., Ganesan, P., Tjong, F. V., Rogers, A. J., Ruipérez-Campillo, S., Somani, S., Clopton, P., Baykaner, T., Rodrigo, M., Zou, J., Haddad, F., Zahari, M., Narayan, S. M. 2023; 10: 1189293

    Abstract

    Segmentation of computed tomography (CT) is important for many clinical procedures including personalized cardiac ablation for the management of cardiac arrhythmias. While segmentation can be automated by machine learning (ML), it is limited by the need for large, labeled training data that may be difficult to obtain. We set out to combine ML of cardiac CT with domain knowledge, which reduces the need for large training datasets by encoding cardiac geometry, which we then tested in independent datasets and in a prospective study of atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation.We mathematically represented atrial anatomy with simple geometric shapes and derived a model to parse cardiac structures in a small set of N = 6 digital hearts. The model, termed "virtual dissection," was used to train ML to segment cardiac CT in N = 20 patients, then tested in independent datasets and in a prospective study.In independent test cohorts (N = 160) from 2 Institutions with different CT scanners, atrial structures were accurately segmented with Dice scores of 96.7% in internal (IQR: 95.3%-97.7%) and 93.5% in external (IQR: 91.9%-94.7%) test data, with good agreement with experts (r = 0.99; p < 0.0001). In a prospective study of 42 patients at ablation, this approach reduced segmentation time by 85% (2.3 ± 0.8 vs. 15.0 ± 6.9 min, p < 0.0001), yet provided similar Dice scores to experts (93.9% (IQR: 93.0%-94.6%) vs. 94.4% (IQR: 92.8%-95.7%), p = NS).Encoding cardiac geometry using mathematical models greatly accelerated training of ML to segment CT, reducing the need for large training sets while retaining accuracy in independent test data. Combining ML with domain knowledge may have broad applications.

    View details for DOI 10.3389/fcvm.2023.1189293

    View details for PubMedID 37849936

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC10577270

  • Quantifying a spectrum of clinical response in atrial tachyarrhythmias using spatiotemporal synchronization of electrograms. Europace : European pacing, arrhythmias, and cardiac electrophysiology : journal of the working groups on cardiac pacing, arrhythmias, and cardiac cellular electrophysiology of the European Society of Cardiology Ganesan, P., Deb, B., Feng, R., Rodrigo, M., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Rogers, A. J., Clopton, P., Wang, P. J., Zeemering, S., Schotten, U., Rappel, W., Narayan, S. M. 2023

    Abstract

    AIMS: There is a clinical spectrum for atrial tachyarrhythmias wherein most patients with atrial tachycardia (AT) and some with atrial fibrillation (AF) respond to ablation, while others do not. It is undefined if this clinical spectrum has pathophysiological signatures. This study aims to test the hypothesis that the size of spatial regions showing repetitive synchronized electrogram (EGM) shapes over time reveals a spectrum from AT, to AF patients who respond acutely to ablation, to AF patients without acute response.METHODS AND RESULTS: We studied n = 160 patients (35% women, 65.0 ± 10.4 years) of whom (i) n = 75 had AF terminated by ablation propensity matched to (ii) n = 75 without AF termination and (iii) n = 10 with AT. All patients had mapping by 64-pole baskets to identify areas of repetitive activity (REACT) to correlate unipolar EGMs in shape over time. Synchronized regions (REACT) were largest in AT, smaller in AF termination, and smallest in non-termination cohorts (0.63 ± 0.15, 0.37 ± 0.22, and 0.22 ± 0.18, P < 0.001). Area under the curve for predicting AF termination in hold-out cohorts was 0.72 ± 0.03. Simulations showed that lower REACT represented greater variability in clinical EGM timing and shape. Unsupervised machine learning of REACT and extensive (50) clinical variables yielded four clusters of increasing risk for AF termination (P < 0.01, chi2), which were more predictive than clinical profiles alone (P < 0.001).CONCLUSION: The area of synchronized EGMs within the atrium reveals a spectrum of clinical response in atrial tachyarrhythmias. These fundamental EGM properties, which do not reflect any predetermined mechanism or mapping technology, predict outcome and offer a platform to compare mapping tools and mechanisms between AF patient groups.

    View details for DOI 10.1093/europace/euad055

    View details for PubMedID 36932716

  • VENTRICULAR TACHYCARDIA PREDICTS ATRIAL FIBRILLATION RECURRENCE POST ABLATION: A PROPENSITY SCORE-MATCHED ANALYSIS OF A LARGE PROSPECTIVE STUDY Azizi, Z., Deb, B., Feng, R., Ganesan, P., Rogers, A. J., Chang, H., Clopton, P., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2023: 186
  • OBSTRUCTIVE SLEEP APNEA PORTENDS STROKE IN YOUNG INDIVIDUALS WITHOUT ATRIAL FIBRILLATION: A LARGE REGISTRY STUDY Deb, B., Vasireddi, S., Bhatia, N. K., Rogers, A. J., Clopton, P., Baykaner, T., Ganesan, P., Feng, R., Azizi, Z., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2023: 130
  • Optimizing ChatGPT to Detect VT Recurrence From Complex Medical Notes Feng, R., Brennan, K. A., Azizi, Z., Goyal, J., Pedron, M., Chang, H., Ganesan, P., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Deb, B., Clopton, P. L., Baykaner, T., Rogers, A. J., Narayan, S. M. 2023
  • Variance In Endocardial Voltage Between The Sinus Node And Other Bi-atrial Regions In Patients With Atrial Fibrillation Srivastava, V., Ganesan, P., Goyal, J., Deb, B., Azizi, Z., Narayan, S. M. 2023
  • Predicting acute termination and non-termination during ablation of human atrial fibrillation using quantitative indices. Frontiers in physiology Kappel, C., Reiss, M., Rodrigo, M., Ganesan, P., Narayan, S. M., Rappel, W. J. 2022; 13: 939350

    Abstract

    Background: Termination of atrial fibrillation (AF), the most common arrhythmia in the United States, during catheter ablation is an attractive procedural endpoint, which has been associated with improved long-term outcome in some studies. It is not clear, however, whether it is possible to predict termination using clinical data. We developed and applied three quantitative indices in global multielectrode recordings of AF prior to ablation: average dominant frequency (ADF), spectral power index (SPI), and electrogram quality index (EQI). Methods: In N = 42 persistent AF patients (65 ± 9 years, 14% female) we collected unipolar electrograms from 64-pole baskets (Abbott, CA). We studied N = 17 patients in whom AF terminated during ablation ("Term") and N = 25 in whom it did not ("Non-term"). For each index, we determined its ability to predict ablation by computing receiver operating characteristic (ROC) and calculated the area under the curve (AUC). Results: The ADF did not differ for Term and Non-term patients at 5.28 ± 0.82 Hz and 5.51 ± 0.81 Hz, respectively (p = 0.34). Conversely, the SPI for these two groups was. 0.85 (0.80-0.92) and 0.97 (0.93-0.98) and the EQI was 0.61 (0.58-0.64) and 0.56 (0.55-0.59) (p < 0.0001). The AUC for predicting AF termination for the SPI was 0.85 ([0.68, 0.95] 95% CI), and for the EQI, 0.86 ([0.72, 0.95] 95% CI). Conclusion: Both the EQI and the SPI may provide a useful clinical tool to predict procedural ablation outcome in persistent AF patients. Future studies are required to identify which physiological features of AF are revealed by these indices and hence linked to AF termination or non-termination.

    View details for DOI 10.3389/fphys.2022.939350

    View details for PubMedID 36483297

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC9725096

  • Atrial fibrillation signatures on intracardiac electrograms identified by deep learning. Computers in biology and medicine Rodrigo, M., Alhusseini, M. I., Rogers, A. J., Krittanawong, C., Thakur, S., Feng, R., Ganesan, P., Narayan, S. M. 2022; 145: 105451

    Abstract

    BACKGROUND: Automatic detection of atrial fibrillation (AF) by cardiac devices is increasingly common yet suboptimally groups AF, flutter or tachycardia (AT) together as 'high rate events'. This may delay or misdirect therapy.OBJECTIVE: We hypothesized that deep learning (DL) can accurately classify AF from AT by revealing electrogram (EGM) signatures.METHODS: We studied 86 patients in whom the diagnosis of AF or AT was established at electrophysiological study (25 female, 65±11 years). Custom DL architectures were trained to identify AF using N=29,340 unipolar and N=23,760 bipolar EGM segments. We compared DL to traditional classifiers based on rate or regularity. We explained DL using computer models to assess the impact of controlled variations in shape, rate and timing on AF/AT classification in 246,067 EGMs reconstructed from clinical data.RESULTS: DL identified AF with AUC of 0.97±0.04 (unipolar) and 0.92±0.09 (bipolar). Rule-based classifiers misclassified 10-12% of cases. DL classification was explained by regularity in EGM shape (13%) or timing (26%), and rate (60%; p<0.001), and also by a set of unipolar EGM shapes that classified as AF independent of rate or regularity. Overall, the optimal AF 'fingerprint' comprised these specific EGM shapes, >15% timing variation, <0.48 correlation in beat-to-beat EGM shapes and CL<190ms (p<0.001).CONCLUSIONS: Deep learning of intracardiac EGMs can identify AF or AT via signatures of rate, regularity in timing or shape, and specific EGM shapes. Future work should examine if these signatures differ between different clinical subpopulations with AF.

    View details for DOI 10.1016/j.compbiomed.2022.105451

    View details for PubMedID 35429831

  • TARGETING SYNCHRONIZED ELECTROGRAM ISLANDS WITHIN ATRIAL FIBRILLATION FOR ABLATION Ganesan, P., Deb, B., Feng, R., Rodrigo, M., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Bhatia, N. K., Rogers, A. J., Clopton, P., Rappel, W., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2022: 3
  • A MORPHOLOGICAL OPERATION-BASED APPROACH TO AUTOMATICALLY SEPARATE AND LABEL LEFT ATRIUM BODY AND PULMONARY VEINS Feng, R., Ganesan, P., Deb, B., Rogers, A. J., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Rodrigo, M., Zaharia, M., Clopton, P., Rappel, W., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2022: 1244
  • UNSUPERVISED MACHINE LEARNING IDENTIFIES PHENOTYPES FOR ATRIAL FIBRILLATION THAT PREDICT ACUTE ABLATION SUCCESS Deb, B., Ganesan, P., Feng, R., Bhatia, N. K., Rogers, A. J., Ruiperez-Campillo, S., Clopton, P., Narayan, S. M. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2022: 51
  • Deep learning model calibration for improving performance in class-imbalanced medical image classification tasks. PloS one Rajaraman, S., Ganesan, P., Antani, S. 1800; 17 (1): e0262838

    Abstract

    In medical image classification tasks, it is common to find that the number of normal samples far exceeds the number of abnormal samples. In such class-imbalanced situations, reliable training of deep neural networks continues to be a major challenge, therefore biasing the predicted class probabilities toward the majority class. Calibration has been proposed to alleviate some of these effects. However, there is insufficient analysis explaining whether and when calibrating a model would be beneficial. In this study, we perform a systematic analysis of the effect of model calibration on its performance on two medical image modalities, namely, chest X-rays and fundus images, using various deep learning classifier backbones. For this, we study the following variations: (i) the degree of imbalances in the dataset used for training; (ii) calibration methods; and (iii) two classification thresholds, namely, default threshold of 0.5, and optimal threshold from precision-recall (PR) curves. Our results indicate that at the default classification threshold of 0.5, the performance achieved through calibration is significantly superior (p < 0.05) to using uncalibrated probabilities. However, at the PR-guided threshold, these gains are not significantly different (p > 0.05). This observation holds for both image modalities and at varying degrees of imbalance. The code is available at https://github.com/sivaramakrishnan-rajaraman/Model_calibration.

    View details for DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0262838

    View details for PubMedID 35085334

  • Identifying Atrial Fibrillation Mechanisms for Personalized Medicine. Journal of clinical medicine Deb, B., Ganesan, P., Feng, R., Narayan, S. M. 2021; 10 (23)

    Abstract

    Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a major cause of heart failure and stroke. The early maintenance of sinus rhythm has been shown to reduce major cardiovascular endpoints, yet is difficult to achieve. For instance, it is unclear how discoveries at the genetic and cellular level can be used to tailor pharmacotherapy. For non-pharmacologic therapy, pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) remains the cornerstone of rhythm control, yet has suboptimal success. Improving these therapies will likely require a multifaceted approach that personalizes therapy based on mechanisms measured in individuals across biological scales. We review AF mechanisms from cell-to-organ-to-patient from this perspective of personalized medicine, linking them to potential clinical indices and biomarkers, and discuss how these data could influence therapy. We conclude by describing approaches to improve ablation, including the emergence of several mapping systems that are in use today.

    View details for DOI 10.3390/jcm10235679

    View details for PubMedID 34884381

  • CONSISTENT SPATIOTEMPORAL VECTORS IN ATRIAL FIBRILLATION PREDICT RESPONSE TO ABLATION Ganesan, P., Bhatia, N., Beck, T. C., Ravi, N., Rogers, A., Krummen, D., Wang, P., Rappel, W., Narayan, S. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2021: 334
  • CLASSIFICATION OF INDIVIDUAL ATRIAL INTRACARDIAC ELECTROGRAMS BY DEEP LEARNING Rodrigo, M., Rogers, A., Ganesan, P., Krittanawong, C., Alhusseini, M., Narayan, S. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2021: 3217
  • PROBING MACHINE LEARNING TO SEPARATE ATRIAL FIBRILLATION FROM OTHER ARRHYTHMIAS Rodrigo, M., Rogers, A., Ganesan, P., Alhusseini, M., Krittanawong, C., Narayan, S. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2021: 3410
  • MACHINE LEARNING CLASSIFIES INTRACARDIAC ELECTROGRAMS OF ATRIAL FIBRILLATION FROM OTHER ARRHYTHMIAS Rodrigo, M., Rogers, A., Ganesan, P., Krittanawong, C., Alhusseini, M., Narayan, S. ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC. 2021: 279
  • Three dimensional reconstruction to visualize atrial fibrillation activation patterns on curved atrial geometry. PloS one Abad, R., Collart, O., Ganesan, P., Rogers, A. J., Alhusseini, M. I., Rodrigo, M., Narayan, S. M., Rappel, W. 2021; 16 (4): e0249873

    Abstract

    BACKGROUND: The rotational activation created by spiral waves may be a mechanism for atrial fibrillation (AF), yet it is unclear how activation patterns obtained from endocardial baskets are influenced by the 3D geometric curvature of the atrium or 'unfolding' into 2D maps. We develop algorithms that can visualize spiral waves and their tip locations on curved atrial geometries. We use these algorithms to quantify differences in AF maps and spiral tip locations between 3D basket reconstructions, projection onto 3D anatomical shells and unfolded 2D surfaces.METHODS: We tested our algorithms in N = 20 patients in whom AF was recorded from 64-pole baskets (Abbott, CA). Phase maps were generated by non-proprietary software to identify the tips of spiral waves, indicated by phase singularities. The number and density of spiral tips were compared in patient-specific 3D shells constructed from the basket, as well as 3D maps from clinical electroanatomic mapping systems and 2D maps.RESULTS: Patients (59.4±12.7 yrs, 60% M) showed 1.7±0.8 phase singularities/patient, in whom ablation terminated AF in 11/20 patients (55%). There was no difference in the location of phase singularities, between 3D curved surfaces and 2D unfolded surfaces, with a median correlation coefficient between phase singularity density maps of 0.985 (0.978-0.990). No significant impact was noted by phase singularities location in more curved regions or relative to the basket location (p>0.1).CONCLUSIONS: AF maps and phase singularities mapped by endocardial baskets are qualitatively and quantitatively similar whether calculated by 3D phase maps on patient-specific curved atrial geometries or in 2D. Phase maps on patient-specific geometries may be easier to interpret relative to critical structures for ablation planning.

    View details for DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0249873

    View details for PubMedID 33836026

  • Deep Neural Network Trained on Surface ECG Improves Diagnostic Accuracy of Prior Myocardial Infarction Over Q Wave Analysis Yildirim, O., Baloglu, U. B., Talo, M., Ganesan, P., Tung, J. S., Kang, G., Tooley, J., Alhusseini, M., Baykaner, T., Wang, P. J., Perez, M., Tereshchenko, L., Narayan, S. M., Rogers, A. J., IEEE IEEE. 2021
  • Atrial fibrillation source area probability mapping using electrogram patterns of multipole catheters BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING ONLINE Ganesan, P., Cherry, E. M., Huang, D. T., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B. 2020; 19 (1): 27

    Abstract

    Catheter ablation therapy involving isolation of pulmonary veins (PVs) from the left atrium is performed to terminate atrial fibrillation (AF). Unfortunately, standalone PV isolation procedure has shown to be a suboptimal success with AF continuation or recurrence. One reason, especially in patients with persistent or high-burden paroxysmal AF, is known to be due to the formation of repeating-pattern AF sources with a meandering core inside the atria. However, there is a need for accurate mapping and localization of these sources during catheter ablation.A novel AF source area probability (ASAP) mapping algorithm was developed and evaluated in 2D and 3D atrial simulated tissues with various arrhythmia scenarios and a retrospective study with three cases of clinical human AF. The ASAP mapping analyzes the electrograms collected from a multipole diagnostic catheter that is commonly used during catheter ablation procedure to intelligently sample the atria and delineate the trajectory path of a meandering repeating-pattern AF source. ASAP starts by placing the diagnostic catheter at an arbitrary location in the atria. It analyzes the recorded bipolar electrograms to build an ASAP map over the atrium anatomy and suggests an optimal location for the subsequent catheter location. ASAP then determines from the constructed ASAP map if an AF source has been delineated. If so, the catheter navigation is stopped and the algorithm provides the area of the AF source. Otherwise, the catheter is navigated to the suggested location, and the process is continued until an AF-source area is delineated.ASAP delineated the AF source in over 95% of the simulated human AF cases within less than eight catheter placements regardless of the initial catheter placement. The success of ASAP in the clinical AF was confirmed by the ablation outcomes and the electrogram patterns at the delineated area.Our analysis indicates the potential of the ASAP mapping to provide accurate information about the area of the meandering repeating-pattern AF sources as AF ablation targets for effective AF termination. Our algorithm could improve the success of AF catheter ablation therapy by locating and subsequently targeting patient-specific and repeating-pattern AF sources inside the atria.

    View details for DOI 10.1186/s12938-020-00769-0

    View details for Web of Science ID 000531635800001

    View details for PubMedID 32370754

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC7201756

  • Re-evaluating The Multiple Wavelet Hypothesis for Atrial Fibrillation. Heart rhythm Ganesan, P. n., Narayan, S. M. 2020

    View details for DOI 10.1016/j.hrthm.2020.07.009

    View details for PubMedID 32673795

  • Locating Atrial Fibrillation Rotor and Focal Sources Using Iterative Navigation of Multipole Diagnostic Catheters CARDIOVASCULAR ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY Ganesan, P., Cherry, E. M., Huang, D. T., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B. 2019; 10 (2): 354–66

    Abstract

    Multi-polar diagnostic catheters are used to construct the 3D electro-anatomic mapping of the atrium during atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation procedures; however, it remains unclear how to use the electrograms recorded by these catheters to locate AF-driving sites known as focal and rotor source types. The purpose of this study is to present the first algorithm to iteratively navigate a circular multi-polar catheter to locate AF focal and rotor sources without the need to map the entire atria.Starting from an initial location, the algorithm, which was blinded to the location and type of the AF source, iteratively advanced a Lasso catheter based on its electrogram characteristics. The algorithm stopped the catheter when it located of an AF source and identified the type. The efficiency of the algorithm is validated using a set of simulated focal and rotor-driven arrhythmias in fibrotic human 2D and 3D atrial tissue.Our study shows the feasibility of locating AF sources with a success rate of greater than 95.25% within average 7.56 ± 2.28 placements independently of the initial position of the catheter and the source type.The algorithm could play a critical role in clinical electrophysiology laboratories for mapping patient-specific ablation of AF sources located outside the pulmonary veins and improving the procedure success.

    View details for DOI 10.1007/s13239-019-00414-5

    View details for Web of Science ID 000468445200013

    View details for PubMedID 30989616

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC6527788

  • Iterative navigation of multipole diagnostic catheters to locate repeating-pattern atrial fibrillation drivers JOURNAL OF CARDIOVASCULAR ELECTROPHYSIOLOGY Ganesan, P., Salmin, A., Cherry, E. M., Huang, D. T., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B. 2019; 30 (5): 758–68

    Abstract

    Targeting repeating-pattern atrial fibrillation (AF) sources (reentry or focal drivers) can help in patient-specific ablation therapy for AF; however, the development of reliable and accurate tools for locating such sources remains a major challenge. We describe iterative catheter navigation (ICAN) algorithm to locate AF drivers using a conventional circular Lasso catheter.At each step, the algorithm analyzes 10 bipolar electrograms recoded at a given catheter location and the history of previous catheter movements to determine if the source is inside the catheter loop. If not, it calculates new coordinates and selects a new position for the catheter. The process continues until a source is located. The algorithm was evaluated in a computer model of atrial tissue with various degrees of fibrosis under a broad range of arrhythmia scenarios. The latter included slow and fast reentry, macroreentry, figure-of-eight reentry, and fibrillatory conduction. Depending on the initial distance of the catheter from the source and scenario, it took about 3 to 16 steps to localize an AF source. In 94% of cases, the identified location was within 4 mm from the source, independently of the initial position of the catheter. The algorithm worked equally well in the presence of patchy fibrosis, low-voltage areas, fragmented electrograms, and dominant-frequency gradients.AF repeating-pattern sources can be localized using circular catheters without the need to map the entire tissue. The proposed algorithm has the potential to become a useful tool for patient-specific ablation of AF sources located outside the pulmonary veins.

    View details for DOI 10.1111/jce.13872

    View details for Web of Science ID 000471046800018

    View details for PubMedID 30725499

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC6554033

  • Assessment of Data Augmentation Strategies Toward Performance Improvement of Abnormality Classification in Chest Radiographs. Conference proceedings : ... Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Annual Conference Ganesan, P., Rajaraman, S., Long, R., Ghoraani, B., Antani, S. 2019; 2019: 841–44

    Abstract

    Image augmentation is a commonly performed technique to prevent class imbalance in datasets to compensate for insufficient training samples, or to prevent model overfitting. Traditional augmentation (TA) techniques include various image transformations, such as rotation, translation, channel splitting, etc. Alternatively, Generative Adversarial Network (GAN), due to its proven ability to synthesize convincingly-realistic images, has been used to perform image augmentation as well. However, it is unclear whether GAN augmentation (GA) strategy provides an advantage over TA for medical image classification tasks. In this paper, we study the usefulness of TA and GA for classifying abnormal chest X-ray (CXR) images. We first trained a progressive-growing GAN (PG-GAN) to synthesize high-resolution CXRs for performing GA. Then, we trained an abnormality classifier using three training sets individually - training set with TA, with GA and with no augmentation (NA). Finally, we analyzed the abnormality classifier's performance for the three training cases, which led to the following conclusions: (1) GAN strategy is not always superior to TA for improving the classifier's performance; (2) in comparison to NA, however, both TA and GA leads to a significant performance improvement; and, (3) increasing the quantity of images in TA and GA strategies also improves the classifier's performance.

    View details for DOI 10.1109/EMBC.2019.8857516

    View details for PubMedID 31946026

  • Performance Evaluation of a Generative Adversarial Network for Deblurring Mobile-phone Cervical Images Ganesan, P., Xue, Z., Singh, S., Long, R., Ghoraani, B., Antani, S., IEEE IEEE. 2019: 4487–90
  • Assessment of Data Augmentation Strategies Toward Performance Improvement of Abnormality Classification in Chest Radiographs Ganesan, P., Rajaraman, S., Long, R., Ghoraani, B., Antani, S., IEEE IEEE. 2019: 841–44
  • Performance Evaluation of a Generative Adversarial Network for Deblurring Mobile-phone Cervical Images. Conference proceedings : ... Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Annual Conference Ganesan, P., Xue, Z., Singh, S., Long, R., Ghoraani, B., Antani, S. 2019; 2019: 4487–90

    Abstract

    Visual examination forms an integral part of cervical cancer screening. With the recent rise in smartphone-based health technologies, capturing cervical images using a smartphone camera for telemedicine and automated screening is gaining popularity. However, such images are highly prone to image corruption, typically out-of-focus target or camera shake blur. In this paper, we applied a generative adversarial network (GAN) to deblur mobile-phone cervical (MC) images, and we evaluate the deblur quality using various measures. Our evaluation process is three-fold: first, we calculate the peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) and the structural similarity (SSIM) of a test dataset with ground truth availability. Next, we calculate the perception based image quality evaluator (PIQE) score of a test dataset without ground truth availability. Finally, we classify a dataset of blurred and the corresponding deblurred images into normal/abnormal MC images. The resulting change in classification accuracy was our final assessment. Our evaluation experiments show that deblurring of MC images can potentially improve the accuracy of both manual and automated cancerous lesion screening.

    View details for DOI 10.1109/EMBC.2019.8857124

    View details for PubMedID 31946862

  • Developing an Iterative Tracking Algorithm to Guide a Catheter Towards Atrial Fibrillation Rotor Sources in Simulated Fibrotic Tissue Ganesan, P., Zilouchian, H., Cherry, E. M., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B., IEEE IEEE. 2018

    Abstract

    Locating atrial fibrillation (AF) rotor sources can help target ablation therapy for AF. Our aim was to develop a catheter-tracking algorithm to locate AF rotor sources using a conventional 20-electrode circular catheter. We simulated rotor-driven arrhythmias in homogeneous and fibrotic human atrial tissue and evaluated the algorithm for different initial catheter positions. The algorithm guided and detected a rotor with a success rate of greater than 97.9% independently of the initial position of the catheter with an accuracy of greater than 2.3±1.4 mm.

    View details for DOI 10.22489/CinC.2018.129

    View details for Web of Science ID 000482598700049

    View details for PubMedID 31681821

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC6824711

  • Development of a Rotor-Mapping Algorithm to Locate Ablation Targets During Atrial Fibrillation Ganesan, P., Cherry, E. M., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B., IEEE IEEE. 2018: 41–44

    Abstract

    Catheter ablation therapy involving isolation of pulmonary veins (PVs) remains the cornerstone procedure to treat AF. However, due to the sub-optimal success rates of PV isolation, there is a need for new ablation techniques to locate AF ablation targets known as rotors, outside of the PVs. In this paper, we developed a novel rotor-mapping algorithm that uses a conventional diagnostic catheter, Lasso, to locate a rotor source. The algorithm, called the Region of Rotor (ROR) Mapping, utilizes the characteristics of local bipolar electrograms to navigate the catheter's iterative placements while generating a map, overlaid on the atrial anatomy, that displays the potential rotor region. We evaluated the developed ROR mapping algorithm using a 2D simulation of AF on a tissue with heterogeneous conduction properties. The results demonstrated a significant success rate of 93% in accurately locating the region of the rotor with a mean distance of 1.4mm from the ground truth trajectory. The algorithm could play a critical role in mapping non-PV AF ablation targets and improving the outcome of AF ablation.

    View details for Web of Science ID 000459872900011

    View details for PubMedID 31693015

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC6830728

  • Simulation of Spiral Waves and Point Sources in Atrial Fibrillation with Application to Rotor Localization Ganesan, P., Shillieto, K. E., Ghoraani, B., Bamidis, P. D., Konstantinidis, S. T., Rodrigues, P. P. IEEE. 2017: 379–84

    Abstract

    Cardiac simulations play an important role in studies involving understanding and investigating the mechanisms of cardiac arrhythmias. Today, studies of arrhythmogenesis and maintenance are largely being performed by creating simulations of a particular arrhythmia with high accuracy comparable to the results of clinical experiments. Atrial fibrillation (AF), the most common arrhythmia in the United States and many other parts of the world, is one of the major field where simulation and modeling is largely used. AF simulations not only assist in understanding its mechanisms but also help to develop, evaluate and improve the computer algorithms used in electrophysiology (EP) systems for ablation therapies. In this paper, we begin with a brief overeview of some common techniques used in simulations to simulate two major AF mechanisms - spiral waves (or rotors) and point (or focal) sources. We particularly focus on 2D simulations using Nygren et al.'s mathematical model of human atrial cell. Then, we elucidate an application of the developed AF simulation to an algorithm designed for localizing AF rotors for improving current AF ablation therapies. Our simulation methods and results, along with the other discussions presented in this paper is aimed to provide engineers and professionals with a working-knowledge of application-specific simulations of spirals and foci.

    View details for DOI 10.1109/CBMS.2017.161

    View details for Web of Science ID 000424864800078

    View details for PubMedID 29629398

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC5886720

  • Characterization of Electrograms from Multipolar Diagnostic Catheters during Atrial Fibrillation. BioMed research international Ganesan, P., Cherry, E. M., Pertsov, A. M., Ghoraani, B. 2015; 2015: 272954

    Abstract

    Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common arrhythmia in USA with more than 2.3 million people affected annually. Catheter ablation procedure is a method for treatment of AF, which involves 3D electroanatomic mapping of the patient's left atrium (LA) by maneuvering a conventional multipolar diagnostic catheter (MPDC) along the LA endocardial surface after which pulmonary vein (PV) isolation is performed, thus eliminating the AF triggers originating from the PVs. However, it remains unclear how to effectively utilize the information provided by the MPDC to locate the AF-sustaining sites, known as sustained rotor-like activities (RotAs). In this study, we use computer modeling to investigate the variations in the characteristics of the MPDC electrograms, namely, total conduction delay (TCD) and average cycle length (CL), as the MPDC moves towards a RotA source. Subsequently, a study with a human subject was performed in order to verify the predictions of the simulation study. The conclusions from this study may be used to iteratively direct an MPDC towards RotA sources thus allowing the RotAs to be localized for customized and improved AF ablation.

    View details for DOI 10.1155/2015/272954

    View details for PubMedID 26581316

    View details for PubMedCentralID PMC4637153