1. A method for classifying tissue as normal or abnormal tissue based on volumetric image data, comprising: obtaining segmented volumetric image data for predetermined tissue of interest; generating, with a processor, a 2D voxel representation of the segmented volumetric image data, wherein the 2D voxel representation is based on de-noised voxels and voxel normalized distances, and takes into account a normal tissue perfusion gradient; and classifying, with the processor, voxels of the segmented volumetric image data as corresponding to abnormal and normal tissue based on the 2D voxel representation.