Multithreshold Image Segmentation Technique Using Remora Optimization Algorithm for Diabetic Retinopathy Detection from Fundus Images

One of the most common complications of diabetes mellitus is diabetic retinopathy (DR), which produces lesions on the retina. A novel framework for DR detection and classification was proposed in this study. The proposed work includes four stages: pre-processing, segmentation, feature extraction, and classification. Initially, the image pre-processing is performed and after that, the Multi threshold-based Remora Optimization (MTRO) algorithm performs the vessel segmentation. The feature extraction and classification process are done by using a Region-based Convolution Neural Network (R-CNN) with Wild Geese Algorithm (WGA). Finally, the proposed R-CNN with WGA effectively classifies the different stages of DR including Non-DR, Proliferative DR, Severe, Moderate DR, Mild DR. The experimental images were collected from the DRIVE database, and the proposed framework exhibited superior DR detection performance. Compared to other existing methods like fully convolutional deep neural network (FCDNN), genetic-search feature selection (GSFS), Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN), and deep learning (DL) techniques, the proposed R-CNN with WGA provided 95.42% accuracy, 93.10% specificity, 93.20% sensitivity, and 98.28% F-score results.