An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification

Skin cancer accounts for over 40% of all cancer diagnoses worldwide. However, accurately diagnosing skin cancer remains challenging for dermatologists, as multiple types of skin cancer often appear visually similar. The diagnostic accuracy of dermatologists ranges between 62% and 80%. Although AI mo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Hwanyoung Lee, Seeun Cho, Jiyoon Song, Hoyoung Kim, Youjin Shin
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-01-01
Series:Sensors
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/2/394
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1832587478165356544
author Hwanyoung Lee
Seeun Cho
Jiyoon Song
Hoyoung Kim
Youjin Shin
author_facet Hwanyoung Lee
Seeun Cho
Jiyoon Song
Hoyoung Kim
Youjin Shin
author_sort Hwanyoung Lee
collection DOAJ
description Skin cancer accounts for over 40% of all cancer diagnoses worldwide. However, accurately diagnosing skin cancer remains challenging for dermatologists, as multiple types of skin cancer often appear visually similar. The diagnostic accuracy of dermatologists ranges between 62% and 80%. Although AI models have shown promise in assisting with skin cancer classification in various studies, obtaining the large-scale medical image datasets required for AI model training is not straightforward. To address this limitation, this study proposes the AGS network, designed to overcome the challenges of small datasets and enhance the performance of skin cancer classifiers. The AGS network integrates three key modules: Augmentation (A), GAN (G), and Segmentation (S). It was evaluated using eight deep learning classifiers—GoogLeNet, DenseNet201, ResNet50, MobileNet V3, EfficientNet B0, ViT, EfficientNet V2, and Swin Transformers—on the HAM10000 dataset. Five model configurations were also tested to assess the contribution of each module. The results showed that all eight classifiers demonstrated consistent performance improvements with the AGS network. In particular, EfficientNet V2 + AGS achieved the most significant performance gains over the baseline model, with an increase of +0.1808 in Accuracy and +0.1674 in F1-Score. Among all configurations, ResNet50+AGS achieved the best overall performance, with an Accuracy of 95.87% and an F1-Score of 95.73%. While most previous studies focused on single augmentation methods, this study demonstrates the effectiveness of combining multiple augmentation techniques within an integrated framework. The AGS network demonstrates how integrating diverse methods can improve the performance of skin cancer classification models.
format Article
id doaj-art-15b72636d4874544b1bc91446e556ea3
institution Kabale University
issn 1424-8220
language English
publishDate 2025-01-01
publisher MDPI AG
record_format Article
series Sensors
spelling doaj-art-15b72636d4874544b1bc91446e556ea32025-01-24T13:48:46ZengMDPI AGSensors1424-82202025-01-0125239410.3390/s25020394An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer ClassificationHwanyoung Lee0Seeun Cho1Jiyoon Song2Hoyoung Kim3Youjin Shin4Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering, The Catholic University of Korea, Bucheon 14662, Republic of KoreaDepartment of Artificial Intelligence, The Catholic University of Korea, Bucheon 14662, Republic of KoreaDepartment of Artificial Intelligence, The Catholic University of Korea, Bucheon 14662, Republic of KoreaDepartment of Computer Science, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794, USADepartment of Data Science, The Catholic University of Korea, Bucheon 14662, Republic of KoreaSkin cancer accounts for over 40% of all cancer diagnoses worldwide. However, accurately diagnosing skin cancer remains challenging for dermatologists, as multiple types of skin cancer often appear visually similar. The diagnostic accuracy of dermatologists ranges between 62% and 80%. Although AI models have shown promise in assisting with skin cancer classification in various studies, obtaining the large-scale medical image datasets required for AI model training is not straightforward. To address this limitation, this study proposes the AGS network, designed to overcome the challenges of small datasets and enhance the performance of skin cancer classifiers. The AGS network integrates three key modules: Augmentation (A), GAN (G), and Segmentation (S). It was evaluated using eight deep learning classifiers—GoogLeNet, DenseNet201, ResNet50, MobileNet V3, EfficientNet B0, ViT, EfficientNet V2, and Swin Transformers—on the HAM10000 dataset. Five model configurations were also tested to assess the contribution of each module. The results showed that all eight classifiers demonstrated consistent performance improvements with the AGS network. In particular, EfficientNet V2 + AGS achieved the most significant performance gains over the baseline model, with an increase of +0.1808 in Accuracy and +0.1674 in F1-Score. Among all configurations, ResNet50+AGS achieved the best overall performance, with an Accuracy of 95.87% and an F1-Score of 95.73%. While most previous studies focused on single augmentation methods, this study demonstrates the effectiveness of combining multiple augmentation techniques within an integrated framework. The AGS network demonstrates how integrating diverse methods can improve the performance of skin cancer classification models.https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/2/394skin cancer classificationmedical image analysisPGGANUnet
spellingShingle Hwanyoung Lee
Seeun Cho
Jiyoon Song
Hoyoung Kim
Youjin Shin
An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
Sensors
skin cancer classification
medical image analysis
PGGAN
Unet
title An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
title_full An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
title_fullStr An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
title_full_unstemmed An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
title_short An Enhanced Approach Using AGS Network for Skin Cancer Classification
title_sort enhanced approach using ags network for skin cancer classification
topic skin cancer classification
medical image analysis
PGGAN
Unet
url https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/2/394
work_keys_str_mv AT hwanyounglee anenhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT seeuncho anenhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT jiyoonsong anenhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT hoyoungkim anenhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT youjinshin anenhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT hwanyounglee enhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT seeuncho enhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT jiyoonsong enhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT hoyoungkim enhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification
AT youjinshin enhancedapproachusingagsnetworkforskincancerclassification