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Computer Science @ Rochester
Friday, December 16, 2011
12:45 PM
CSB 703
Axel Wismueller
University of Rochester
Multidimensional Analysis of Spatio-Temporal Image Patterns in Biomedicine
Technical innovations in medical cross-sectional imaging have opened up new vistas for the exploration of the human body, enabling both high spatial and temporal resolution. However, these techniques have led to vast amounts of image data whose precise and reliable visual analysis by medical doctors and bioscientists requires a considerable amount of human intervention and expertise, thus resulting in a cost factor of substantial economic relevance. Hence, the computer-assisted analysis of medical image data has moved into the focus of interest as an issue of high priority research efforts.

Here, innovative approaches to exploratory analysis of huge complex spatio-temporal patterns play a key role to improve computer-assisted signal and image processing in biomedicine. The presentation covers new methods for pattern recognition and computer-aided diagnosis in the field of biomedical imaging, such as functional MRI for human brain mapping, therapy control by automatic lesion detection in multiple sclerosis, and new approaches to breast cancer diagnosis in MRI mammography. An outlook to current projects in bioinformatics confirms the broad applicability of the presented methods.

Biosketch

Axel Wismueller, M.D., Ph.D., studied medicine at the Technical University of Munich and the University of Regensburg, Germany, with study exchange programs in Switzerland and the USA (Yale University). He received his M.D. (Dr. med.) degree from the Technical University of Munich for a scientific thesis in neurology in 1992. He successfully passed the U.S. medical examinations ECFMG and FLEX. In parallel to his clinical work in internal medicine, he studied physics at the University of Munich where he received a master's degree (Dipl.-Phys. Univ.) in theoretical physics from the University of Munich in 1996 for a scientific thesis on pattern recognition. From 1997 to 2007, he served as a Fellow of Radiology at the Department of Clinical Radiology, University of Munich, where he founded the Digital Image Processing Group. In 2006, he received a Ph.D. degree (Dr. rer. nat.) from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Technical University of Munich for a thesis on a novel pattern recognition algorithm invented by him (Exploratory Observation Machine - XOM) for which he holds an international patent. His main research interest is focused on innovative strategies for pattern recognition and computational intelligence in biomedicine, with a specific emphasis on computer-aided diagnosis in biomedical imaging, such as functional MRI for human brain mapping and the diagnosis of breast cancer in MR mammography. Dr. Wismueller is author of more than 100 scientific journal and conference publications and holds several international patents. He holds a New York State medical license, a German medical board certification in Radiology (Facharzt für Radiologie), a state doctorate (Habilitation), and a venia legendi for Radiology at the University of Munich. Since 2007, he has been serving as Director of the Computational Radiology Laboratory at the University of Rochester, New York, USA, where he is Associate Professor for Radiology, Biomedical, and Electrical Engineering.