  Dynamic medical imaging is usually limited in application due to the large
radiation doses and longer image scanning and reconstruction times. Existing
methods attempt to reduce the dynamic sequence by interpolating the volumes
between the acquired image volumes. However, these methods are limited to
either 2D images and/or are unable to support large variations in the motion
between the image volume sequences. In this paper, we present a spatiotemporal
volumetric interpolation network (SVIN) designed for 4D dynamic medical images.
SVIN introduces dual networks: first is the spatiotemporal motion network that
leverages the 3D convolutional neural network (CNN) for unsupervised parametric
volumetric registration to derive spatiotemporal motion field from two-image
volumes; the second is the sequential volumetric interpolation network, which
uses the derived motion field to interpolate image volumes, together with a new
regression-based module to characterize the periodic motion cycles in
functional organ structures. We also introduce an adaptive multi-scale
architecture to capture the volumetric large anatomy motions. Experimental
results demonstrated that our SVIN outperformed state-of-the-art temporal
medical interpolation methods and natural video interpolation methods that have
been extended to support volumetric images. Our ablation study further
exemplified that our motion network was able to better represent the large
functional motion compared with the state-of-the-art unsupervised medical
registration methods.
