Assad Oberai of Rensselaer Polytechnic to speak on “The Theory and Practice of Biomechanical Imaging” — April 7

The Michigan Institute for Computational Discovery and Engineering Seminar Series will host Assad Oberai of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. The title of his talk is “The Theory and Practice of Biomechanical Engineering.” Time/Day: 4 p.m., Monday, April 7 Location: Room 2315 G.G. Brown Building, 2350 Hayward For more information: http://micde.umich.edu/seminar-series/assad-oberai/ Abstract: It is now well recognized that a host of imaging modalities (including ultrasound, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Second Harmonic Imaging, and optical microscopy) can be used to “watch” tissue as it deforms in response to an excitation. The result is a detailed map of the deformation field in the interior of the tissue. In Biomechanical Imaging (BMI) we use this deformation field in conjunction with a constitutive law to determine the spatial distribution of material properties of the tissue by solving an inverse problem. Images of material properties thus obtained can be used to quantify the health of the tissue. They can be used to detect, diagnose and monitor cancerous lesions, detect vulnerable plaque in arteries, diagnose liver cirrhosis, detect the onset of Alzheimer’s disease, and generate patient specific models for surgical training and planning. In this talk, Prof. Oberai will describe the mathematical and computational aspects of solving this class of inverse problems, and their applications in biology and medicine.