Virtual Bronchoscopic Pathfinder (VBP): An Open-Source Web-Based System for Airway Segmentation, Cost-Field Path Planning, and Cross-Device 3D Navigation

Virtual Bronchoscopic Navigation (VBN) is a critical tool for guiding bronchoscopes toward peripheral pulmonary lesions (PPLs), yet its widespread clinical adoption has been limited by the high cost of proprietary software and the fragility of segmentation-dependent path planning in distal airways. In this study, we present Virtual Bronchoscopic Pathfinder (VBP), a complete, open-source, web-based VBN system that addresses both barriers. VBP integrates five components: (i) a connectivity-aware deep learning model for pulmonary airway segmentation incorporating Connectivity-Aware Surrogate (CAS) and Local-Sensitive Distance (LSD) modules; (ii) TotalSegmentator for automated tumor localization; (iii) a topology-preserving 3D thinning algorithm implemented in C++ for centerline extraction; (iv) a bidirectional Dijkstra algorithm operating on a three-tier anatomical cost field (centerline cost 1.0, airway lumen cost 10.0, parenchyma cost 100.0) to guarantee continuous path generation even under partial skeleton disconnection; and (v) a zero-footprint browser-based visualization interface built on the vtk.js engine, providing synchronized 2D axial viewing and interactive 3D volume rendering. VBP was validated on 306 thin-section CT series (154 subjects) from the public Lung-PET-CT-Dx dataset, achieving a path-generation success rate of 100% across the anatomically valid cohort. The system is publicly accessible at https://vbn.ziovision.ai and was confirmed to operate without client-side installation across desktop, laptop, and mobile device configurations. These results demonstrate that a reliable, accessible, and scalable VBN system can be constructed entirely from open-source components, offering a practical foundation for imaging informatics research and future intra-procedural bronchoscopic guidance.