Biomedical & Molecular Imaging

Biomedical and molecular imaging picture

The Biomedical and Molecular Imaging (BMI) Track emphasizes the development and application of cutting-edge imaging technologies, molecular imaging probes, and image processing techniques.

Through coursework, seminars, journal clubs, and their own research, students in the BMI Track will be exposed to a wide range of traditional and emerging imaging methodologies. For more details, review the BMI Degree Plan.

Research Topics

The current BMI faculty consists of basic scientists, biomedical engineers, and clinicians interested in developing new imaging methodologies in both basic and clinical research at scales ranging from the molecular level to the whole body. Examples include:

Novel applications of noninvasive imaging including MRI, MRS, SPECT, PET, ultrasound, and optical imaging.
Functional brain imaging using fMRI and near infrared imaging (NIR).
RF pulse sequence development for clinical MRI.
Metabolic imaging using isotope tracers and NMR spectroscopy.
MRI-guided high intensity focused ultrasound for tissue ablation and therapeutics.
Responsive MR agents and targeted PET agents for imaging biological function in vivo.
Molecular imaging of cancer using targeted nanoparticles.
Combinatorial chemistry to identify and image biological targets.

Track Director

Research Interests: Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy; ultra-high field MRI; hardware; RF coils; B0 shimming; sequence development; data analysis

Faculty

Research Interests: Molecular Imaging; optical imaging; instrument development; image-guided surgery; cancer treatment, molecular probes; spectroscopy, multimodal nuclear and magnetic imaging; stimulated thermal imaging, nanomedicine

Research Interests: Immunotherapy and radiotherapy in cancer prevention and treatment; premature aging and carcinogenesis; DNA damage response signaling in heart development

Research Interests: Development of hybrid positron emission tomography (PET) (e.g. PET-CT and PET-MR) tools to enable precision imaging for the care and study of oncology, neurology, and cardiology patients.

Research Interests: NMR spectroscopy and mass spectroscopy in conjunction with the application of stable isotope tracers to study metabolic function

Research Interests: Developing non- and minimally invasive optical tools to monitor deep tissues in health and disease, as well as throughout therapy

Research Interests: Nanomedicine and image-guided drug delivery for novel diagnostic and therapeutic applications in oncology

Research Interests: Autonomous Microscopy, Molecular Multiplexing, Optical Probe Development, and Content Rich Histopathology

Research Interests: The long-term goal of our lab’s research is to develop and implement imaging technologies that provide unprecedented insight into cancer biology.

Research Interests: Activatable optical/MRI imaging probes to study tumor metabolism and theranostic nanomedicine for cancer-targeted drug therapy

Research Interests: Evaluate the use of newly designed biodegradable stints to treat pulmonary artery stenosis

Training Tracks: Biomedical and Molecular Imaging; Biomaterials, Mechanics and Tissue Engineering

Research Interests: Heart-lung interaction; lung morphometry; structure-function correlation of lung growth

Training Track: Biomedical and Molecular Imaging

Research Interests: Assessment of ventriculographie-arterial coupling in congenital and acquired heart disease. Cardiac MRI for improved vascular imaging

Research Interests: Cloud and GPU-based high-performance computing in medical physics and imaging; automatic radiotherapy treatment planning; adaptive radiotherapy; image-guided radiotherapy; low-dose and dynamic-cone-beam CT

Research Interests: Generation and application of hyperpolarized¹³C-labeled compounds and⁸⁹Y-complexes for MRI/Radiopharmaceutical applications

Research Interests: Neuroimaging, MRI, Dynamic Brain Connectivity, Dopamine, Astrocytes, Reward and Learning

Research Interests: Probe engineering and targeted drug delivery to islet cells for treating diabetes; Islet biology with an emphasis on functional analysis on zinc signaling and zinc transporters in islet endocrine cells.

Research Interests: Bioresponsive nanomaterials for in vivo detection and therapy; targeted and activatable ultrasound (US) agents for the detection of inflammation and cancer

Research Interests: Development and clinical translation of novel MR imaging techniques for detection and assessment of therapy response; non-contrast perfusion using arterial spin labeled (ASL) MRI; fat/water separated MRI; Whole-body MRI; MR Physics

Research Interests: Parturition (the process of labor); cervical ripening; male and female reproductive biology

Research Interests: Deep Learning applications in neuroimaging including brain tumor molecular marker prediction, Traumatic Brain Injury, MEG, MRI, fMRI

Research Interests: ¹³C MRS methods for measuring cardiac intermediary-metabolism flux and function analysis/neurotransmitter metabolism of human brain

Research Interests: Tumor pathophysiology and MR assessment of prognostic biomarkers/hypoxia and pH

Research Interests: Developing state-of-the-art machine-learning approaches to extract radiological imaging and imaging-genomic biomarkers for individualized prognostics in neuroscience and oncological applications

Research Interests: Application of structural (X-ray, CT, and MR) and functional (SPECT and PET) imaging methods to quantify changes in bone mass and metabolism induced by metabolic bone diseases; in vivo assessment of beta-cell mass and function by novel probes; novel PET and SPECT probe development for bone cells

Research Interests: Development of noninvasive molecular imaging tools to elucidate in vivo metabolism

Research Interests: Development of novel MRI techniques for improved diagnosis of abdominal/pelvic diseases and noninvasive in vivo assessment of physiology and response to therapy in tumors

Research Interests: Cell motility and mechanics, corneal repair and regeneration, in-vivo confocal imaging

Research Interests: Spatial organization of tumors by combining machine identified phenotypes and existing pathology scoring within the framework established by cancer biology

Research Interests: Role of cycloxygenase-2 in radiation and chemo-resistance, role of small molecule inhibitors as radio-sensitizers

Research Interests: Polymer and materials chemistry, drug and gene delivery, RNAi, biomedical imaging, detection and treatment of cancer

Research Interests: Development of PET, SPECT, and MRI imaging probes to assess biological abnormalities and evaluation of disease treatment

Research Interests: Endogenous and exogenous MRI contrast agents and mechanisms in vivo, CEST and PARACEST imaging, hyperpolarization

Research Interests: Tomographic image reconstruction; cone-beam computed tomography; image-guided radiation therapy; medical imaging processing

Research Interests: Biomedical optics, In Vivo cell tracking, Optical tomography-guided radiation therapy and Ultra-high dose rate irradiation

Training Track: Biomedical and Molecular Imaging

Research Interests: Application of Advanced Neuroimaging Techniques (fMRI, DTI, MRS, etc). Correction of magnetic susceptibility artifacts on brain MRI caused by orthodontic appliances. MR Quality Assurance and Safety. MRI Assessment of Body Iron. Application of AI in medical imaging

Research Interests: My methodology research is focused on model development for high-dimensional data such as gene expression, epigenomics, copy number variation, proteomics, genome-wide RNAi functional screening data and brain image data.

Associate Members

These faculty members do not accept graduate students. They participate in teaching, co-mentoring, exam and dissertation committees, and all other program activities.

Research Interests: Biomedical imaging, molecular imaging, optical device design, nanomaterials, cancer biology and treatment

Research Interests: Sub concussive head impact exposure in contact sports, traumatic brain injury, magnetoencephalography

Research Interests: Molecular-imaging instrumentation, linear and nonlinear diffraction tomography, tensor tomography, applied inverse problems

Research Interests:Fast and motion-robust MRI acquisition and reconstruction, High-resolution MRI for in vivo imaging intracortical structure and deep nuclei, Novel MRI contrast and quantification of tissue properties

Research Interests: Molecular Imaging, lung cancer, kidney cancer, tumor microenvironment

Research Interests: In vivo MRS for studies of energy and phospholipids metabolism in brain and skeletal muscle

Research Interests: Deciphering molecular characteristics of tumors using Radiogenomics; Identifying quantitative imaging parameters reflective of molecular alterations in solid tumors as noninvasive prognostic and predictive tools; Characterizing biomarkers of bone metastasis

Research Interests: Applied mathematics and MRI methods for translational research in liver imaging with special focus on evaluation of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD)