D²BOF-COVIDNet: A Framework of Deep Bayesian Optimization and Fusion-Assisted Optimal Deep Features for COVID-19 Classification Using Chest X-ray and MRI Scans

Background and Objective: In 2019, a corona virus disease (COVID-19) was detected in China that affected millions of people around the world. On 11 March 2020, the WHO declared this disease a pandemic. Currently, more than 200 countries in the world have been affected by this disease. The manual diagnosis of this disease using chest X-ray (CXR) images and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is time consuming and always requires an expert person; therefore, researchers introduced several computerized techniques using computer vision methods. The recent computerized techniques face some challenges, such as low contrast CTX images, the manual initialization of hyperparameters, and redundant features that mislead the classification accuracy. Methods: In this paper, we proposed a novel framework for COVID-19 classification using deep Bayesian optimization and improved canonical correlation analysis (ICCA). In this proposed framework, we initially performed data augmentation for better training of the selected deep models. After that, two pre-trained deep models were employed (ResNet50 and InceptionV3) and trained using transfer learning. The hyperparameters of both models were initialized through Bayesian optimization. Both trained models were utilized for feature extractions and fused using an ICCA-based approach. The fused features were further optimized using an improved tree growth optimization algorithm that finally was classified using a neural network classifier. Results: The experimental process was conducted on five publically available datasets and achieved an accuracy of 99.6, 98.5, 99.9, 99.5, and 100%. Conclusion: The comparison with recent methods and t-test-based analysis showed the significance of this proposed framework.