Deep Anatomical Federated Network (Dafne): An open client-server framework for the continuous, collaborative improvement of deep learning-based medical image segmentation

Purpose: To present and evaluate Dafne (deep anatomical federated network), a freely available decentralized, collaborative deep learning system for the semantic segmentation of radiological images through federated incremental learning. Materials and Methods: Dafne is free software with a client-server architecture. The client side is an advanced user interface that applies the deep learning models stored on the server to the user's data and allows the user to check and refine the prediction. Incremental learning is then performed at the client's side and sent back to the server, where it is integrated into the root model. Dafne was evaluated locally, by assessing the performance gain across model generations on 38 MRI datasets of the lower legs, and through the analysis of real-world usage statistics (n = 639 use-cases). Results: Dafne demonstrated a statistically improvement in the accuracy of semantic segmentation over time (average increase of the Dice Similarity Coefficient by 0.007 points/generation on the local validation set, p < 0.001). Qualitatively, the models showed enhanced performance on various radiologic image types, including those not present in the initial training sets, indicating good model generalizability. Conclusion: Dafne showed improvement in segmentation quality over time, demonstrating potential for learning and generalization.