Chinese Visible Human Data Sets*

Shao-Xiang Zhang

Authors: Shao-Xiang Zhang 1, Zheng-Jin Liu 1 , Li-Wen Tan 1 , Ming-Guo Qiu 1, Qi-Yu Li 1, Rong-Xia Liao 1, Kai Li 1, Gao-Yu Cui 1, Yan-Li Guo 1, Xiao-Ping Yang 1, Wei-Guo Zhang 2, Xian-Hong Chen 2, Jin-Hua Chen 2, Shi-Yi Ding 3, Wei Chen 3, Ming Lu 3, Jian You 3

( 1 Department of Anatomy, College of Medicine, Third Military Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China; 2 Department of Imaging Diagnosis, Daping Hospital, Third Military Medical University, Chongqing 400042, China; 3 Department of Radiology, Southwest Hospital, Third Military Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China .)

The research on digital visible human is of great significance and application value. The US Visible Human Project (VHP) created the first digital image data set of a complete human (one male and one female) in 1995. To promote a worldwide application-oriented VHR, more visible human data sets representative of different populations of the world are in demand. The Chinese Visible Human (CVH) male (created in Oct. 2002) and female (created in Feb. 2003) datasets were created at our lab. The Chinese Visible Human Project(CVHP) achieved greater integrity of images, easier blood vessel identification, and were free of organic lesion. The most noteworthy technical advance of CVHP was the construction of a low temperature laboratory, which contributed to the prevention of small structures (including teeth, concha nasalis, and articular cartilage) from falling off out of the milling surface. Thus, better integrity of images can be ensured. Compared with the data set of US VHP, the following features of our data set represent innovations:

• Acquired from serial sections of the whole body, our data set presents no sectional dataloss.
• Our digital images achieve a higher resolution.
• Vascular perfusion was performed to allow easier blood vessel identification.
• Measures were taken to prevent small structures from falling off from milling surface. Thus, integrity of images was ensured.
• The selected subjects were of moderate age, size and height so as to be more representative.

Key words: Chinese Visible Human (CVH); dataset; digital anatomy; sectional anatomy; computer assisted medicine ( CAM)

*The project was supported by the National Natural Science Found of China for distinguished scholars (No.39925022)