EDIRNet: an unsupervised deformable registration model for X-ray and neutron images

For high-precision industrial non-destructive testing, multimodal image registration technology can be employed to register X-ray and neutron images. X-ray and neutron image registration algorithms usually use conventional methods through iterative optimization. These methods will increase the cost of registration time and require more initialization parameters. The imaging results of internal sample structures can suffer from edge blurring due to the influence of a neutron beam collimator aperture, X-ray focal point, and imaging angles. We present an unsupervised learning model, EDIRNet, based on deep learning for deformable registration of X-ray and neutron images. We define the registration process as a function capable of estimating the flow field from input images. By leveraging deep learning techniques, we effectively parameterize this function. Consequently, given a registration image, our optimized network parameters enable rapid and direct estimation of the flow field between the images. We design an attention-based edge enhancement module to enhance the edge features of the image. For evaluating our presented network model, we utilize a dataset including 552 pairs of X-ray and neutron images. The experimental results show that the registration accuracy of EDIRNet reaches 93.09%. Compared with traditional algorithms, the accuracy of EDIRNet is improved by 3.17%, and the registration time is reduced by 28.75 s.