An innovative deep learning framework for skin cancer detection employing ConvNeXtV2 and focal self-attention mechanisms

Deep learning for cerebral vascular occlusion segmentation: A novel ConvNeXtV2 and GRN-integrated U-Net framework for diffusion-weighted imaging

Cerebral vascular occlusion is a serious condition that can lead to stroke and permanent neurological damage due to insufficient oxygen and nutrients reaching brain tissue. Early diagnosis and accurate segmentation are critical for effective treatment planning. Due to its high soft tissue contrast, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is commonly used for detecting these occlusions such as ischemic stroke. However, challenges such as low contrast, noise, and heterogeneous lesion structures in MRI images complicate manual segmentation and often lead to misinterpretations. As a result, deep learning-based Computer-Aided Diagnosis (CAD) systems are essential for faster and more accurate diagnosis and treatment methods, although they can sometimes face challenges such as high computational costs and difficulties in segmenting small or irregular lesions. This study proposes a novel U-Net architecture enhanced with ConvNeXtV2 blocks and GRN-based Multi-Layer Perceptrons (MLP) to address these challenges in cerebral vascular occlusion segmentation. This is the first application of ConvNeXtV2 in this domain. The proposed model significantly improves segmentation accuracy, even in low-contrast regions, while maintaining high computational efficiency, which is crucial for real-world clinical applications. To reduce false positives and improve overall accuracy, small lesions (≤5 pixels) were removed in the preprocessing step with the support of expert clinicians. Experimental results on the ISLES 2022 dataset showed superior performance with an Intersection over Union (IoU) of 0.8015 and a Dice coefficient of 0.8894. Comparative analyses indicate that the proposed model achieves higher segmentation accuracy than existing U-Net variants and other methods, offering a promising solution for clinical use.

SkinEHDLF a hybrid deep learning approach for accurate skin cancer classification in complex systems

Skin cancer represents a significant global public health issue, and prompt and precise detection is essential for effective treatment. This study introduces SkinEHDLF, an innovative deep-learning model that enhances skin cancer classification. SkinEHDLF utilizes the advantages of several advanced models, i.e., ConvNeXt, EfficientNetV2, and Swin Transformer, while integrating an adaptive attention-based feature fusion mechanism to enhance the synthesis of acquired features. This hybrid methodology combines ConvNeXt's proficient feature extraction capabilities, EfficientNetV2's scalability, and Swin Transformer's long-range attention mechanisms, resulting in a highly accurate and dependable model. The adaptive attention mechanism dynamically optimizes feature fusion, enabling the model to focus on the most relevant information, enhancing accuracy and reducing false positives. We trained and evaluated SkinEHDLF using the ISIC 2024 dataset, which comprises 401,059 skin lesion images extracted from 3D total-body photography. The dataset is divided into three categories: melanoma, benign lesions, and noncancerous skin anomalies. The findings indicate the superiority of SkinEHDLF compared to current models. In binary skin cancer classification, SkinEHDLF surpassed baseline models, achieving an AUROC of 99.8% and an accuracy of 98.76%. The model attained 98.6% accuracy, 97.9% precision, 97.3% recall, and 99.7% AUROC across all lesion categories in multi-class classification. SkinEHDLF demonstrates a 7.9% enhancement in accuracy and a 28% decrease in false positives, outperforming leading models including ResNet-50, EfficientNet-B3, ViT-B16, and hybrid methodologies such as ResNet-50 + EfficientNet and ViT + CNN, thereby positioning itself as a more precise and reliable solution for automated skin cancer detection. These findings underscore SkinEHDLF's capacity to transform dermatological diagnostics by providing a scalable and accurate method for classifying skin cancer.

Comparative analysis of automated foul detection in football using deep learning architectures

Automated foul detection in football represents a challenging task due to the dynamic nature of the game, the variability in player movements, and the ambiguity in differentiating fouls from regular physical contact. This study presents a comprehensive comparative evaluation of eight state-of-the-art Deep Learning (DL) architectures - EfficientNetV2, ResNet50, VGG16, Xception, InceptionV3, MobileNetV2, InceptionResNetV2, and DenseNet121 - applied to the task of automated foul detection in football. The models were trained and evaluated using a curated dataset comprising 7000 images, which was split into 70% for training (4,900 images), 20% for validation (1,400 images), and 10% for testing (700 images). To ensure fair evaluation, the test set was balanced to contain 350 images depicting foul events and 350 images representing non-foul scenarios, although perfect balance was subject to class distribution constraints. Performance was assessed across multiple metrics, including test accuracy, precision, recall, F1-score, and Area Under the Receiver Operating Characteristic Curve (AUC). The results demonstrate that InceptionResNetV2 achieved the highest test accuracy of 87.57% and a strong F1-score of 0.8966, closely followed by DenseNet121, which attained the highest precision of 0.9786 and an AUC of 0.9641, indicating superior discriminatory power. Lightweight models such as MobileNetV2 also performed competitively, highlighting their potential for real-time deployment. The findings highlight the strengths and trade-offs between model complexity, accuracy, and generalizability, underscoring the viability of integrating DL architectures into existing football officiating systems, such as the Video Assistant Referee (VAR). Furthermore, the study emphasizes the importance of model explainability through techniques such as Gradient-weighted Class Activation Mapping++ (GradCAM++), ensuring that automated decisions can be accompanied by interpretable visual evidence. This comparative evaluation serves as a foundation for future research aimed at enhancing real-time foul detection through multimodal data fusion, temporal modeling, and improved domain adaptation techniques.

An interpretable framework for gastric cancer classification using multi-channel attention mechanisms and transfer learning approach on histopathology images

The importance of gastric cancer (GC) and the role of deep learning techniques in categorizing GC histopathology images have recently increased. Identifying the drawbacks of traditional deep learning models, including lack of interpretability, inability to capture complex patterns, lack of adaptability, and sensitivity to noise. A multi-channel attention mechanism-based framework is proposed that can overcome the limitations of conventional deep learning models by dynamically focusing on relevant features, enhancing extraction, and capturing complex relationships in medical data. The proposed framework uses three different attention mechanism channels and convolutional neural networks to extract multichannel features during the classification process. The proposed framework's strong performance is confirmed by competitive experiments conducted on a publicly available Gastric Histopathology Sub-size Image Database, which yielded remarkable classification accuracies of 99.07% and 98.48% on the validation and testing sets, respectively. Additionally, on the HCRF dataset, the framework achieved high classification accuracy of 99.84% and 99.65% on the validation and testing sets, respectively. The effectiveness and interchangeability of the three channels are further confirmed by ablation and interchangeability experiments, highlighting the remarkable performance of the framework in GC histopathological image classification tasks. This offers an advanced and pragmatic artificial intelligence solution that addresses challenges posed by unique medical image characteristics for intricate image analysis. The proposed approach in artificial intelligence medical engineering demonstrates significant potential for enhancing diagnostic precision by achieving high classification accuracy and treatment outcomes.

U-Net-Based Models for Precise Brain Stroke Segmentation

Ischemic stroke, a widespread neurological condition with a substantial mortality rate, necessitates accurate delineation of affected regions to enable proper evaluation of patient outcomes. However, such precision is complicated by factors like variable lesion sizes, noise interference, and the overlapping intensity characteristics of different tissue structures. This research addresses these issues by focusing on the segmentation of Diffusion Weighted Imaging (DWI) scans from the ISLES 2022 dataset and conducting a comparative assessment of three advanced deep learning models: the U-Net framework, its U-Net++ extension, and the Attention U-Net. Applying consistent evaluation criteria specifically, Intersection over Union (IoU), Dice Similarity Coefficient (DSC), and recall the Attention U-Net emerged as the superior choice, establishing record high values for IoU (0.8223) and DSC (0.9021). Although U-Net achieved commendable recall, its performance lagged behind that of U-Net++ in other critical measures. These findings underscore the value of integrating attention mechanisms to achieve more precise segmentation. Moreover, they highlight that the Attention U-Net model is a reliable candidate for medical imaging tasks where both accuracy and efficiency hold paramount importance, while U Net and U Net++ may still prove suitable in certain niche scenarios.

A systematic review of deep learning in MRI-based cerebral vascular occlusion-based brain diseases

Neurological disorders, including cerebral vascular occlusions and strokes, present a major global health challenge due to their high mortality rates and long-term disabilities. Early diagnosis, particularly within the first hours, is crucial for preventing irreversible damage and improving patient outcomes. Although neuroimaging techniques like magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have advanced significantly, traditional methods often fail to fully capture the complexity of brain lesions. Deep learning has recently emerged as a powerful tool in medical imaging, offering high accuracy in detecting and segmenting brain anomalies. This review examines 61 MRI-based studies published between 2020 and 2024, focusing on the role of deep learning in diagnosing cerebral vascular occlusion-related conditions. It evaluates the successes and limitations of these studies, including the adequacy and diversity of datasets, and addresses challenges such as data privacy and algorithm explainability. Comparisons between convolutional neural network (CNN)-based and Vision Transformer (ViT)-based approaches reveal distinct advantages and limitations. The findings emphasize the importance of ethically secure frameworks, the inclusion of diverse datasets, and improved model interpretability. Advanced architectures like U-Net variants and transformer-based models are highlighted as promising tools to enhance reliability in clinical applications. By automating complex neuroimaging tasks and improving diagnostic accuracy, deep learning facilitates personalized treatment strategies. This review provides a roadmap for integrating technical advancements into clinical practice, underscoring the transformative potential of deep learning in managing neurological disorders and improving healthcare outcomes globally.

An intelligent framework for skin cancer detection and classification using fusion of Squeeze-Excitation-DenseNet with Metaheuristic-driven ensemble deep learning models

Skin cancer is the most dominant and critical method of cancer, which arises all over the world. Its damaging effects can range from disfigurement to major medical expenditures and even death if not analyzed and preserved timely. Conventional models of skin cancer recognition require a complete physical examination by a specialist, which is time-wasting in a few cases. Computer-aided medicinal analytical methods have gained massive popularity due to their efficiency and effectiveness. This model can assist dermatologists in the initial recognition of skin cancer, which is significant for early diagnosis. An automatic classification model utilizing deep learning (DL) can help doctors perceive the kind of skin lesion and improve the patient's health. The classification of skin cancer is one of the hot topics in the research field, along with the development of DL structure. This manuscript designs and develops a Detection of Skin Cancer Using an Ensemble Deep Learning Model and Gray Wolf Optimization (DSC-EDLMGWO) method. The proposed DSC-EDLMGWO model relies on the recognition and classification of skin cancer in biomedical imaging. The presented DSC-EDLMGWO model initially involves the image preprocessing stage at two levels: contract enhancement using the CLAHE method and noise removal using the wiener filter (WF) model. Furthermore, the proposed DSC-EDLMGWO model utilizes the SE-DenseNet method, which is the fusion of the squeeze-and-excitation (SE) module and DenseNet to extract features. For the classification process, the ensemble of DL models, namely the long short-term memory (LSTM) technique, extreme learning machine (ELM) model, and stacked sparse denoising autoencoder (SSDA) method, is employed. Finally, the gray wolf optimization (GWO) method optimally adjusts the ensemble DL models' hyperparameter values, resulting in more excellent classification performance. The effectiveness of the DSC-EDLMGWO approach is evaluated using a benchmark image database, with outcomes measured across various performance metrics. The experimental validation of the DSC-EDLMGWO approach portrayed a superior accuracy value of 98.38% and 98.17% under HAM10000 and ISIC datasets across other techniques.

Deep structured learning with vision intelligence for oral carcinoma lesion segmentation and classification using medical imaging

Oral carcinoma (OC) is a toxic illness among the most general malignant cancers globally, and it has developed a gradually significant public health concern in emerging and low-to-middle-income states. Late diagnosis, high incidence, and inadequate treatment strategies remain substantial challenges. Analysis at an initial phase is significant for good treatment, prediction, and existence. Despite the current growth in the perception of molecular devices, late analysis and methods near precision medicine for OC patients remain a challenge. A machine learning (ML) model was employed to improve early detection in medicine, aiming to reduce cancer-specific mortality and disease progression. Recent advancements in this approach have significantly enhanced the extraction and diagnosis of critical information from medical images. This paper presents a Deep Structured Learning with Vision Intelligence for Oral Carcinoma Lesion Segmentation and Classification (DSLVI-OCLSC) model for medical imaging. Using medical imaging, the DSLVI-OCLSC model aims to enhance OC's classification and recognition outcomes. To accomplish this, the DSLVI-OCLSC model utilizes wiener filtering (WF) as a pre-processing technique to eliminate the noise. In addition, the ShuffleNetV2 method is used for the group of higher-level deep features from an input image. The convolutional bidirectional long short-term memory network with a multi-head attention mechanism (MA-CNN-BiLSTM) approach is utilized for oral carcinoma recognition and identification. Moreover, the Unet3 + is employed to segment abnormal regions from the classified images. Finally, the sine cosine algorithm (SCA) approach is utilized to hyperparameter-tune the DL model. A wide range of simulations is implemented to ensure the enhanced performance of the DSLVI-OCLSC method under the OC images dataset. The experimental analysis of the DSLVI-OCLSC method portrayed a superior accuracy value of 98.47% over recent approaches.

A robust deep learning framework for multiclass skin cancer classification

Skin cancer represents a significant global health concern, where early and precise diagnosis plays a pivotal role in improving treatment efficacy and patient survival rates. Nonetheless, the inherent visual similarities between benign and malignant lesions pose substantial challenges to accurate classification. To overcome these obstacles, this study proposes an innovative hybrid deep learning model that combines ConvNeXtV2 blocks and separable self-attention mechanisms, tailored to enhance feature extraction and optimize classification performance. The inclusion of ConvNeXtV2 blocks in the initial two stages is driven by their ability to effectively capture fine-grained local features and subtle patterns, which are critical for distinguishing between visually similar lesion types. Meanwhile, the adoption of separable self-attention in the later stages allows the model to selectively prioritize diagnostically relevant regions while minimizing computational complexity, addressing the inefficiencies often associated with traditional self-attention mechanisms. The model was comprehensively trained and validated on the ISIC 2019 dataset, which includes eight distinct skin lesion categories. Advanced methodologies such as data augmentation and transfer learning were employed to further enhance model robustness and reliability. The proposed architecture achieved exceptional performance metrics, with 93.48% accuracy, 93.24% precision, 90.70% recall, and a 91.82% F1-score, outperforming over ten Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) based and over ten Vision Transformer (ViT) based models tested under comparable conditions. Despite its robust performance, the model maintains a compact design with only 21.92 million parameters, making it highly efficient and suitable for model deployment. The Proposed Model demonstrates exceptional accuracy and generalizability across diverse skin lesion classes, establishing a reliable framework for early and accurate skin cancer diagnosis in clinical practice.