AxelWismuellerJan2009

Invited Talk January 2009

Invited Talk by Dr.med.,Dr.rer.nat. Axel Wismueller

Dr.med.,Dr.rer.nat. Axel Wismueller (Associate Professor for Radiology and Biomedical Engineering, University of Rochester, New York) will be giving an invited talk on Friday, Jan. 30, 11:00-12:00, at MI 03.13.010 on "Computer-Aided Diagnosis in Biomedical Imaging: Functional MRI and Pattern Recognition"

Abstract
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. The talk covers new methods for pattern recognition and computer-aided diagnosis in the field of MRI, 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 topical projects in bioinformatics confirms the broad applicability of the presented methods.

Biography
Axel Wismueller 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. 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 German masters degree in theoretical physics from the University of Munich in 1996 for a scientific thesis on pattern recognition. Since 1997, he has been working as a fellow of radiology in the Department of Clinical Radiology at the University of Munich, where he founded the Digital Image Processing Group. In 2006, he received a PhD degree 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. His main research interest is focussed on innovative strategies for computer-aided diagnosis and pattern recognition in MRI data, such as functional MRI for human brain mapping or the diagnosis of breast cancer in MRI mammography. Dr. Wismueller is author of more than 80 scientific journal and conference publications related to pattern recognition in biomedicine. Since August 2007, he is with the University of Rochester, New York, USA, as Associate Professor for both Radiology and Biomedical Engineering.