---
license: cc-by-nc-sa-4.0
language:
- en
tags:
- medical-imaging
- ct-scan
- 3d
- vision-transformer
- self-supervised-learning
- foundation-model
- radiology
library_name: transformers
pipeline_tag: feature-extraction
---
π’ [2026-07-17] SPECTRE now ships a command-line tool: point `spectre embed` at a `.nii`/`.nii.gz` file or a folder of them to get embeddings without writing any Python. Check below for details and usage examples.
π’ [2026-05-20] The pretrained SPECTRE model can now be loaded directly through the `transformers` library, no separate SPECTRE package installation required. Check below for details and usage examples.
π’ [2026-04-10] SPECTRE is now an official baseline for the [**CVPR 2026 Workshop Competition: Foundation Models for General CT Image Diagnosis**](https://www.codabench.org/competitions/12650/)! See `experiments/cvpr26_fm_for_ct_diag_task_1` for scripts and additional details.
π’ [2026-02-21] SPECTRE has been accepted for presentation at **CVPR 2026** (Denver, Colorado, USA)!
π’ [2026-01-20] [Semantic segmentation](https://github.com/cviviers/nnUNet) code and configurations using the nnUNet framework are now released!
# SPECTRE π»π»π»
SPECTRE (**S**elf-Supervised & Cross-Modal **P**r**e**training for **CT** **R**epresentation **E**xtraction) is a **Transformer-based foundation model for 3D Computed Tomography (CT) scans**, trained using **self-supervised learning** (SSL) and **cross-modal visionβlanguage alignment** (VLA). It provides rich and generalizable representations from medical imaging data, which can be fine-tuned for downstream tasks such as segmentation, classification, and anomaly detection.
SPECTRE has been trained on a large cohort of **open-source CT scans** of the **human abdomen and thorax**, as well as **paired radiology reports** and **Electronic Health Record data**, enabling it to capture representations that generalize across datasets and clinical settings.
This repository provides pretrained SPECTRE models together with tools for fine-tuning and evaluation.
## π§ Pretrained Models
The pretrained SPECTRE model can easily be imported using the `transformers` library
```python
from transformers import AutoModel
model = AutoModel.from_pretrained('cclaess/SPECTRE-Large', trust_remote_code=True)
```
or by using the `spectre-fm` package as follows:
```python
from spectre import SpectreImageFeatureExtractor
model = SpectreImageFeatureExtractor.from_pretrained('spectre-large')
```
Run `spectre list-models` to see what is available. Pass `include_feature_combiner=False` for per-crop backbone features instead of one embedding per scan.
### π₯οΈ From the command line
If you just want embeddings out of a CT scan and would rather not write Python:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[inference]"
spectre embed scan.nii.gz -o embeddings/ # one scan
spectre embed /data/scans/ -o embeddings/ # a whole folder
```
This handles everything internally with the defaults SPECTRE was pretrained on: HU windowing to [-1000, 1000], RAS orientation, and 128Γ128Γ64 crops at the scan's native voxel spacing. Each scan produces `.npz` containing `cls` (one vector for the scan) and `patch_tokens` (one vector per crop, shaped to the crop grid), plus a `manifest.csv`. Useful flags: `--backbone-only`, `--device cuda`, `--spacing 0.5 0.5 1.0` to resample, and `--max-crops-per-forward` if you run out of memory. See `spectre embed --help`.
### π From Python
Hand the model a scan in Hounsfield Units and it does the windowing for you:
```python
import torch
# One scan: (C, H, W, D) or (H, W, D), in raw HU.
scan = torch.randn(1, 384, 384, 256) * 500 - 500
with torch.no_grad():
features = model(scan)
print("Features shape:", features.shape) # (T', F') -> a CLS token plus one token per crop
```
Scans of different sizes can be embedded together by passing a list. All crops from all scans go through the backbone in a single pass, and only the feature combiner is split back out per scan:
```python
scans = [scan_a, scan_b, scan_c] # any sizes, all in HU
with torch.no_grad():
features = model.extract(scans) # -> list of (T', F') tensors
```
If you have already windowed the scans yourself, pass the crops and their grid instead, and they are used untouched:
```python
from spectre import window_scan
crops, grid_size = window_scan(scan) # (N, C, 128, 128, 64), (n_h, n_w, n_d)
with torch.no_grad():
features = model(crops, grid_size=grid_size)
```
> **Reading files:** `spectre.load_ct` / `spectre.load_and_window` read `.nii`/`.nii.gz` and need the `[inference]` extra. Everything above works with just `pip install spectre-fm`.
Alternatively, you can download the weights of the separate components through HuggingFace using the following links:
| Architecture | Input Modality | Pretraining Objective | Model Weights |
|---------------------------|--------------------|-------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| SPECTRE-ViT-Local | CT crops | SSL | [Download](https://huggingface.co/cclaess/SPECTRE/resolve/main/spectre_backbone_vit_large_patch16_128_no_vla.pt?download=true) |
| SPECTRE-ViT-Local | CT crops | SSL + VLA | [Download](https://huggingface.co/cclaess/SPECTRE/resolve/main/spectre_backbone_vit_large_patch16_128.pt?download=true) |
| SPECTRE-ViT-Global | Embedded CT crops | VLA | [Download](https://huggingface.co/cclaess/SPECTRE/resolve/main/spectre_combiner_feature_vit_large.pt?download=true) |
| Qwen3-Embedding-0.6B LoRA | Text (radiology) | VLA | [Download](https://huggingface.co/cclaess/SPECTRE/resolve/main/spectre_qwen3_embedding_0.6B_lora.pt?download=true) |
## π©» Segmentation (nnUNet)
If you're looking for a nnUNet-based segmentation pipeline that uses SPECTRE as the backbone, see this [GitHub](https://github.com/cviviers/nnUNet).
## π Repository Contents
This repository is organized as follows:
- π **`src/spectre/`** β Contains the core package, including:
- Pretraining methods
- Model architectures
- Data handling and transformations
- π οΈ **`src/spectre/configs/`** β Stores configuration files for different training settings.
- π¬ **`experiments/`** β Includes Python scripts for running various pretraining and downstream experiments.
- π³ **`Dockerfile`** β Defines the environment for running a local version of SPECTRE inside a container.
## βοΈ Setting Up the Environment
To get up and running with SPECTRE, install the base package with pip:
```bash
pip install spectre-fm
```
This installs only the runtime dependencies needed to load and run the pretrained models.
To read CT scans from `.nii`/`.nii.gz` files or use the `spectre` command-line tool, add the inference extra:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[inference]"
```
If you want to fine-tune or pretrain SPECTRE, install the matching extra:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[training]"
```
If you only need the evaluation stack, install:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[eval]"
```
If training on GDS-enabled systems is required, install the CUDA 12 specific extra:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[gds-cuda12]" # with training stack: "spectre-fm[training,gds-cuda12]"
```
**Note that** `gds-cuda12` is only compatible with CUDA 12.x environments.
To install everything at once, use:
```bash
pip install "spectre-fm[all]"
```
or install the latest updates directly from GitHub:
```bash
pip install git+https://github.com/cclaess/SPECTRE.git
```
## π³ Building and Using Docker
To facilitate deployment and reproducibility, SPECTRE can be run using **Docker**. This allows you to set up a fully functional environment without manually installing dependencies using your own local copy of spectre.
### **Building the Docker Image**
First, ensure you have **Docker** installed. Then, clone and navigate to the repository to build the image:
```bash
git clone https://github.com/cclaess/SPECTRE
cd SPECTRE
docker build -t spectre-fm .
```
### **Running Experiments Inside Docker**
Once the image is built, you can start a container and execute scripts inside it. For example, to run a DINO pretraining experiment:
```bash
docker run --gpus all --rm -v "$(pwd):/mnt" spectre-fm python3 experiments/pretraining/pretrain_dino.py --config_file spectre/configs/dino_default.yaml --output_dir /mnt/outputs/pretraining/dino/
```
- `--gpus all` enables GPU acceleration if available.
- `--rm` removes the container after execution.
- `-v $(pwd):/mnt` mounts the current directory inside the container.
## βοΈ License
- **Code: MIT** β see `LICENSE` (permissive; commercial use permitted).
- **Pretrained model weights: CC-BY-NC-SA** β non-commercial share-alike. The weights and any derivative models that include these weights are NOT cleared for commercial use. See `LICENSE_MODELS` for details and the precise license text.
> Note: the pretrained weights are subject to the original dataset licenses. Users intending to use SPECTRE in commercial settings should verify dataset and model licensing and obtain any required permissions.
## π Citation
If you use SPECTRE in your research or wish to cite it, please use the following BibTeX entry of our [preprint](https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.17209):
```
@misc{claessens_scaling_2025,
title = {Scaling {Self}-{Supervised} and {Cross}-{Modal} {Pretraining} for {Volumetric} {CT} {Transformers}},
url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/2511.17209},
doi = {10.48550/arXiv.2511.17209},
author = {Claessens, Cris and Viviers, Christiaan and D'Amicantonio, Giacomo and Bondarev, Egor and Sommen, Fons van der},
year={2025},
}
```
## π€ Acknowledgements
This project builds upon prior work in self-supervised learning, medical imaging, and transformer-based representation learning. We especially acknowledge [**MONAI**](https://project-monai.github.io/) for their awesome framework and the [**timm**](https://timm.fast.ai/) & [**lightly**](https://docs.lightly.ai/self-supervised-learning/) Python libraries for providing 2D PyTorch models (timm) and object-oriented self-supervised learning methods (lightly), from which we adapted parts of the code for 3D.
[](https://star-history.com/#cclaess/SPECTRE&Date)