Pioneering biomedical-imaging research gets nod
Author: Communications
Posted on Apr 10, 2014
Category: UNB Saint John
In the digital world we rely on machines to get any information we need.
Images, however, are opaque to machines so finding the right image can be very slow. Tagging images to make them machine readable and reusable for researchers, or clinicians, is the focus of pioneering work conducted by Ahmad C. Bukhari, PhD candidate at the University of New Brunswick in Saint John (UNBSJ).
Why is this important? Tagging images makes them easier to identify so users can rapidly derive relevant knowledge and make sound scientific decisions.
Bukhari’s work, a collaboration with researchers at Yale and Harvard Universities, was recently lauded as the best poster at the prestigious Conference on Semantics in Healthcare and Life Science conference in Boston.
“Making biomedical image content explicit is essential in accelerating medical decision making such as diagnosis, treatment plans, follow-up, data management, data reuse for biomedical research and the assessment of care delivery,” explains Dr. Chris Baker, a full professor and research chair at UNBSJ. Baker is also Bukhari’s doctoral supervisor and poster co-author.
Originally from Pakistan, Bukhari has an impressive list of accomplishments in his first 18 months at UNBSJ with the publication of two papers and yet another selection as best poster by the New Brunswick Health Research Foundation for his work on integrated Canada Health census data. He was also selected to attend summer school in Dresden, Germany and has received the President’s Study Award from UNB. He is now continuing to collaborate with researchers from Harvard and Yale universities.
“Ahmad’s image annotation repository is being used in conjunction with the Yale Image Finder (YIF) – an image search engine that indexes approximately two million biomedical image data, along with associated meta-data,” says Baker.
“Ahmad’s work, while in its early stages, will have a wide ranging impact on image data annotation and storage that many scientists will benefit from in the future.”
To arrange a media interview, please contact Heather Campbell.