PUBLIC TALK: Medical Image Computing (MIC): we are living in interesting times

A public lecture by Dr Ron Kikinis, Professor of Radiology, Harvard Medical School

During the last decade, results from basic research in the fields of genetics and immunology have begun to impact treatment in a variety of diseases. Checkpoint therapy, for instance has fundamentally changed the treatment and survival of some patients with melanoma. The medical workplace has transformed from an artisanal organization into an industrial enterprise environment. Workflows in the clinic are increasingly standardized. Their timing and execution are monitored through omnipresent software systems. This has resulted in an acceleration of the pace of care delivery. Imaging and image post-processing have rapidly evolved as well, enabled by ever-increasing computational power, novel sensor systems and novel mathematical approaches. Organizing the data and making it findable and accessible is an ongoing challenge and is investigated through a variety of research efforts. These topics will be reviewed and discussed during the lecture.

Dr Kikinis is the founding Director of the Surgical Planning Laboratory, Department of Radiology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, and a Professor of Radiology at Harvard Medical School. This laboratory was founded in 1990. Before joining Brigham & Women’s Hospital in 1988, he trained as a resident in radiology at the University Hospital in Zurich, and as a researcher in computer vision at the ETH in Zurich, Switzerland. He received his MD degree from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, in 1982. In 2004 he was appointed Professor of Radiology at Harvard Medical School. In 2009 he was the inaugural recipient of the MICCAI Society “Enduring Impact Award”.