U-Net Segmentation Methods for Variable-Contrast XCT Images of
Methane-Bearing Sand Using Small Training Datasets
Abstract
Methane (CH4) hydrate dissociation and CH4 release are potential
geohazards currently investigated using X-ray computed tomography (XCT)
imaging in laboratory experiments. Image segmentation constitutes an
important data processing step for this type of research, but it is
often time consuming, computing resource-intensive and
operator-dependent. Furthermore, segmentation procedures are frequently
tailored for each XCT dataset due to differences in image
characteristics, such as greyscale contrast variations. To address these
issues, an investigation has been carried out using U-Nets, a class of
Convolutional Neural Network, to segment synchrotron radiation XCT
(SRXCT) images of CH4-bearing sand during hydrate formation. Emphasis
was given to CH4 gas bubbles, due to their paucity and low contrast.
Three U-Net deployments previously untried for this task were assessed:
(1) a bespoke 3D hierarchical method, (2) a 2D multi-label, multi-axis
method and (3) RootPainter, an application that combines a 2D U-Net with
interactive corrections. U-Nets were trained using very small
hand-annotated datasets to reduce operator time. Results show high
segmentation accuracy and consistency, with RootPainter slightly
outperforming the alternative approaches and all three methods
surpassing mainstream watershed and thresholding techniques. Greyscale
contrast between material phases was found to affect segmentation
performance, with the lowest metrics corresponding to data exhibiting
the lowest contrast. Segmentation accuracy affected derived parameters
such as CH4-saturation and porosity, but errors were small compared with
gravimetric methods. It was also found that U-Net models trained on low
greyscale contrast images could be used to segment higher-contrast
datasets and also data collected at a different facility, thereby
demonstrating model portability. Such portability is anticipated to be
advantageous when the segmentation of large XCT datasets needs to be
delivered over short timespans.