A comparative study of deep learning for cortical lesion MRI segmentation with explainability analysis in multiple sclerosis.
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LICENSE, under Apache-2.0 · at the source
Overview
15 affiliations
- Faculty of Biology and Medicine, University of Lausanne (UNIL), Lausanne, Switzerland
- Radiology Department, Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV), Lausanne, Switzerland
- MedGIFT, Institute of Informatics, School of Management, HES–SO Valais–Wallis University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland, Sierre, Switzerland
- CIBM Center for Biomedical Imaging, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Translational Imaging in Neurology (ThINK) Basel, Department of Medicine and Biomedical Engineering, University Hospital Basel and University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland
- Multiple Sclerosis Center, Department of Neurology, University Hospital Basel, Basel, Switzerland
- Research Center for Clinical Neuroimmunology and Neuroscience Basel (RC2NB), University Hospital Basel and University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland
- Dipartimento di Scienze della Salute, Università degli Studi di Genova, Genova, Italy
- Division of Radiological Physics, Department of Radiology, University Hospital Basel, Basel, Switzerland
- Department of Neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City, USA
- Translational Neuroradiology Section, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA
- Neuroinflammation Imaging Lab (NIL), Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium
- Department of Neurology, Hôpital Erasme, Hôpital Universitaire de Bruxelles, Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium
- EPFL+ECAL Lab, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland
- Department of Radiology and Medical Informatics, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
Abstract
Cortical lesions (CLs) have emerged as valuable biomarkers in multiple sclerosis (MS), offering high diagnostic specificity and prognostic relevance. However, their routine clinical integration remains limited due to subtle magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) appearance, challenges in expert annotation, and a lack of standardized automated methods. We present a multi-centric comparative study of CL detection and segmentation in MRI. A total of 656 MRI scans, including clinical trial and research data from four institutions, were acquired at 3T and 7T using MP2RAGE and MPRAGE sequences with expert-consensus annotations. We rely on the self-configuring nnU-Net framework, designed for medical imaging segmentation, and propose adaptations tailored to the improved CL detection. We evaluated model generalization through out-of-distribution testing, demonstrating promising lesion detection capabilities with an F1-score of 0.64 and 0.5 in and out of the domain, respectively. We also analyze internal model features and model errors for a better understanding of AI decision-making. Our study examines how data variability, lesion ambiguity, and protocol differences impact model performance, offering future recommendations to address these barriers to clinical adoption. Furthermore, we designed and implemented a medical expert questionnaire for better assessment of clinical value of the model predictions. To reinforce the reproducibility, the implementation and models will be publicly accessible and ready to use at GitHub and Zenodo.
Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.
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Zenodo 3942042
Availability: 1 check, the latest on 28 September 2026: the link answers (HTTP 200)
- 28 September 2026: the link answers (HTTP 200)
francescolr/ms-lesion-segmentation
1ce239db9a7b0435efdadcbae5ba2fe0cbce0777, 26 April 2022Availability: 1 check, the latest on 28 September 2026: the link answers
- 28 September 2026: the link answers
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Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, pages, dates, 20 authors, 8 keywords, 10 MeSH terms, 11 funders, 50 references.
Cite
This paper
Molchanova, N., Cagol, A., Ocampo–Pineda, M., Lu, P., Weigel, M., Chen, X., Beck, E. S., Tsagkas, C., Reich, D. S., Bulcke, C. V., Stölting, A., Borrelli, S., Maggi, P., Lugo, S. B., Lemay, D. R., Depeursinge, A., Granziera, C., Müller, H., Gordaliza, P. M., & Bach Cuadra, M. (2026). A comparative study of deep learning for cortical lesion MRI segmentation with explainability analysis in multiple sclerosis. NeuroImage. Clinical, 50, 104007. https://
BibTeX
@article{molchanova2026c
author = {Molchanova, Nataliia and Cagol, Alessandro and Ocampo–Pineda, Mario and Lu, Po–Jui and Weigel, Matthias and Chen, Xinjie and Beck, Erin S. and Tsagkas, Charidimos and Reich, Daniel S. and Bulcke, Colin Vanden and Stölting, Anna and Borrelli, Serena and Maggi, Pietro and Lugo, Sebastian Baez and Lemay, Delphine Ribes and Depeursinge, Adrien and Granziera, Cristina and Müller, Henning and Gordaliza, Pedro M. and Bach Cuadra, Meritxell},
title = {{A comparative study of deep learning for cortical lesion MRI segmentation with explainability analysis in multiple sclerosis}},
journal = {NeuroImage. Clinical},
year = {2026},
month = may,
volume = {50},
pages = {104007},
publisher = {Elsevier},
issn = {2213-1582},
doi = {10.1016/
url = {https://
pmid = {42224860},
pmcid = {PMC13251776}
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
AU - Molchanova, Nataliia
AU - Cagol, Alessandro
AU - Ocampo–Pineda, Mario
AU - Lu, Po–Jui
AU - Weigel, Matthias
AU - Chen, Xinjie
AU - Beck, Erin S.
AU - Tsagkas, Charidimos
AU - Reich, Daniel S.
AU - Bulcke, Colin Vanden
AU - Stölting, Anna
AU - Borrelli, Serena
AU - Maggi, Pietro
AU - Lugo, Sebastian Baez
AU - Lemay, Delphine Ribes
AU - Depeursinge, Adrien
AU - Granziera, Cristina
AU - Müller, Henning
AU - Gordaliza, Pedro M.
AU - Bach Cuadra, Meritxell
TI - A comparative study of deep learning for cortical lesion MRI segmentation with explainability analysis in multiple sclerosis
T2 - NeuroImage. Clinical
J2 - Neuroimage Clin
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/
VL - 50
SP - 104007
SN - 2213-1582
PB - Elsevier
DO - 10.1016/
UR - https://
LA - en
ER -
CSL-JSON
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