Radiomics and Machine Learning in Brain Tumors and Their Habitat: A Systematic Review

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Radiomics involves the extraction of quantitative features from medical images, which can provide more detailed and objective information about the features of a tumor compared to visual inspection alone. By analyzing the extensive range of features obtained through radiomics, machine-learning techniques can enhance tumor diagnosis, assess treatment response, and predict patient prognosis. This review highlights the mutual impact between the tumor and its microenvironment (habitat), in which tumor cells can modify the microenvironment to promote their growth and survival. At the same time, the habitat can also influence the behavior of tumor cells. Encouragingly, radiomics and machine learning have shown promising potential in diagnosing brain tumors and predicting prognosis. However, several limitations still need to be improved for their practical application in clinical settings. Further research is required to optimize radiomic feature extraction, standardize imaging protocols, validate models on larger datasets, and integrate diverse data to facilitate a more comprehensive analysis. ABSTRACT: Radiomics is a rapidly evolving field that involves extracting and analysing quantitative features from medical images, such as computed tomography or magnetic resonance images. Radiomics has shown promise in brain tumor diagnosis and patient-prognosis prediction by providing more detailed and objective information about tumors’ features than can be obtained from the visual inspection of the images alone. Radiomics data can be analyzed to determine their correlation with a tumor’s genetic status and grade, as well as in the assessment of its recurrence vs. therapeutic response, among other features. In consideration of the multi-parametric and high-dimensional space of features extracted by radiomics, machine learning can further improve tumor diagnosis, treatment response, and patients’ prognoses. There is a growing recognition that tumors and their microenvironments (habitats) mutually influence each other—tumor cells can alter the microenvironment to increase their growth and survival. At the same time, habitats can also influence the behavior of tumor cells. In this systematic review, we investigate the current limitations and future developments in radiomics and machine learning in analysing brain tumors and their habitats.