PET/CT

SPECT/CT

Noninvasive detection of heart transplant rejection.

Characterization of vulnerable plaques.

Real quantification of myocardial perfusion.

PET brain imaging: Alzheimer’s disease, pain modulation, FLT.

UCSF Parnassus

China Basin

VAMC

Applications of 3D image processing and display techniques (including stereoscopic 3D) in medical diagnosis, education, simulation of medical procedures, and intra-operative guidance. Goals of this work include the development of medical student and postgraduate teaching and simulation modules and serious games using 3D image processing and display techniques, interactivity, haptics/force feedback and tissue deformation modeling.

Techniques for the development of online teaching modules, including multi-disciplinary teaching files and remote accessibility of lectures, lessons and other educational materials.

Development of techniques for disease surveillance in remote areas, without conventional web access, including remote portions of Africa and Asia. Applications of these techniques to the delivery of educational materials to 3rd world medical providers.

CT cholangiography in the assessment of biliary disease and living related liver donors.

CT assessment of the complications of endoluminal stent grafts for the repair of aortic aneurysms.

Studies of radiation dose to children from CT scanning using pediatric phantoms and new models of CT equipment.

New studies to examine optical imaging and fluorescent contrast media for examination of breast cancers (in rats) - at least six months required.

Create a digital pediatric teaching file.

Fergus Coakley
fergus.coakley@radiology.ucsf.edu

Abdominal Imaging website

Novel imaging signs based on clinical observations.

Pitfalls and mimics in abdominal radiological practice.

Since becoming section chief in 2001, Dr Coakley has fostered elective participation in Abdominal Imaging by approximately 5-6 medical students annually. These students are strongly encouraged to participate in a research project and the majority have successfully written first author papers. Many have since entered radiology residency programs.

Interested students should contact Dr. Coakley directly for a current list of potential projects.

Heike Daldrup-Link
daldrup@radiology.ucsf.edu

Contrast Agent Research Group website

UCSF Parnassus

Mt. Zion 

China Basin

William Dillon
bill.dillon@radiology.ucsf.edu

Neuroradiology website

Stroke Research

CT – Angio Research

Summer opportunities for students:
Brain, spine and head and neck imaging projects.

Spinal pain management using CT guidance: Follow up of patient outcomes.

UCSF Parnassus

Alisa D. Gean
alisa.gean@radiology.ucsf.edu

Neuroradiology website

SFGH

Orit A. Glenn
orit.glenn@radiology.ucsf.edu

BabyBrain Fetal MRI website

Ella Fung Jones
ella.jones@radiology.ucsf.edu

Optical Imaging Lab website

Develop novel nuclear and optical probes to target new biomarkers for earliest detection of breast premalignancy.

Develop new phosphoramidate-based prostate specific membrane antigen (PSMA) inhibitors imaging agents for prostate cancer detection.

Develop smart optical probes for protease sensing in breast cancer metastatic lymph nodes.

Develop heavy metal-based nanoparticles for multi-modality imaging.

China Basin

Thomas M. Link
tmlink@radiology.ucsf.edu

Musculoskeletal website

UCSF Parnassus

China Basin

Studies characterizing bone and articular cartilage using advanced imaging techniques.

Studies of osteoporosis using magnetic resonance imaging and stage of the art micro CT imaging.

UCSF and UC Berkeley

Training studies to examine plasticity in auditory and somatosensory cortex.

Somatosensory and motor cortical network activation dynamics.

Mapping eloquent cortex and comparisons with intraopertive recordings.

Studies of perception of affective components of speech.

Neural imaging of auditory feedback during speech.

Auditory and somatosensory processing in autism.

Multiscale imaging of auditory and somatosensory cortex in monkeys.

Integration of multimodal functional brain imaging such as MEG, fMRI, DTI, and ECoG.

MRS of the liver for studying fatty liver disease and effects of diet.

Quantification of MRI volume changes in the liver and visceral fat.

Semiautomatic versus manual delineation of the prostate on MRI and correlations with pathology.

UCSF Parnassus MRSC

or

China Basin

SPIO

Pseudocirrhosis

MRSI of Brachytherapy treatment failure.

Comparison of in-vivo MR characterization of atherosclerosis with histo-pathologic evaluation of carotid specimens.

Validation of Contrast-enhanced MR angiography methods.

Youngho Seo
youngho.seo@radiology.ucsf.edu

Physics Research Laboratory website 

Development of combined x-ray/radionuclide imaging technologies for diagnosis of cancer and cardiovascular disease.

Development of high-resolution radionuclide and x-ray technologies for biological research.

Multimodality imaging (SPECT/CT and PET/CT) of prostate cancer management.

PET/CT and SPECT/CT imaging of tumor metabolism and cell proliferation for radiation and surgical treatment planning of cancer.

Development of quantitative imaging techniques of SPECT/CT and PET/CT.

Our research program is suitable for students (undergraduate and graduate), medical students, residents, fellows, and visiting faculty.

UCSF Parnassus

China Basin

Rebecca Smith-Bindman
rebecca.smith-bindman@radiology.ucsf.edu

Evaluating patterns of imaging using different tests, and in particular tests associated with medical radiation (CT, PET, IR) The projects involve characterizing patterns of imaging by diagnosis (for example renal stone patients), chronic disease (such as IBD) or among patients who should get very little radiation such as pregnant women and children. The projects also will look at patterns of referral - for example, so some specialities refer a lot of patients. The projects use data from UCSF, a large national group of HMOs and data from several state medicaid programs

Quantifying the radiation associated with different tests and evaluating factors that predict high or low dose. This project involves primary data collection from several HMOs

Evaluating the risk of cancer associated with specific findings (such as thyroid nodules and incidental findings seen on ultrasound or CT imaging, such as renal masses, hemangiomas.) These projects involve linking clinical radiology data bases (UCSF, or HMO research network) with population based cancer registries to assess the risk of various findings. The goal is to develop interpretation schemes, analagous to BIRADS for mammography, for other imaging tests

Evaluating the utilization and outcomes and variation in mammography. Much of this focuses on assessing quality, and access to care by vulnerable populations. These projects use data form a coalition of mammography registries in several states.

Developing software to codify radiology reports into important findings and impressions. We will classify several thousand reports by manual review and test our modification of existing software (caTIES) to accurately characterize these abnormalities.

Colin Studholme
colin.studholme@ucsf.edu

Biomedical Image Computing Group website

Two main funded R01 projects on methods for imaging and modelling brain growth in foetuses (running for 2 years) and premature babies (just starting).

Most of this work involves the use of computational anatomy techniques to mathematically describe brain anatomy and its change over time.

There could be a range of possible projects that could be derived from the methods we are developing: Relating anatomical metrics to outcomes and also looking at normal brain growth patterns.

Mike Weiner
Michael.Weiner@ucsf.edu

Multimodality imaging of changes in the brain associated with normal aging, Alzheimer's disease, mild cognitive impairment, frontal temporal dementia, semantic dementia , post traumatic stress disorder, epilepsy, traumatic brain injury, parkinson's disease
a) we have thousands of 1.5 T research MRIS, and many hundreds of 4 Tesla research MRIs including high resolution structural imaging T2 weighted scans, and FLAIR diffusion tensor imaging DTI
arterial spin labeled perfusion imaging to quantify cerebral blood flow
b) all data is in a well organized data base with demographic information, neuropsychological tests, genetic data
c) there are many many types of projects that can be performed including: i) using available data ( i.e processed MRIs) and performing statistical analysis on the data to test hypotheses concerning changes in the brain, differences between diagnostic groups, diagnostic certainty, and correlations with symtoms, leading to papers; ii) using available RAW MRIs,and learning to use software for image processing
d) of especial interest, we are a leader in developing multimodality approaches where structrual, perfusion and DTI data are combined and analyzed together

Finally, we have data from the Alzheiemr's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative which has thousands of longitudinal scans from 800 subjects, all in a very well organized data base. Many paper can easily be written from this data.

Stroke CT and MR imaging research, including perfusion-CT.

CT imaging of intracranial aneurysm.

CT imaging of vasospasm.

CT and MRI evaluation of carotid atherosclerotic diseases.

Correlation of carotid and coronary artery imaging.

CT and MR imaging of cerebral venous thrombosis.

Computer Aided Detection of Colorectal Masses.

Comparison of Barium enema, Virtual Colonoscopy and Colonoscopy.

Contrast-enhanced Virtual Colonoscopy – Is there increased sensitivity and specificity for lesion detection?

Development of a “prepless” version of Virtual Colonoscopy.

Extracolonic findings on Virtual Colonoscopy.

Performance of Multidetector CT using low dose protocol.

Comparison of 3D rendering techniques for Virtual Colonoscopy.

Translucency view for distinguishing types of colonic polyps.

Perforemance3 of VC in a Screening Population-ACRIN.

Automated quantification of lumenal distention on human data sets.

CT Angiography vs Angiography for endovascular aortic stent-grafts.

Screening for hepatocellular carcinoma in patients with advanced liver disease

CT Angiography of Visceral Vessels.

CT Angiography of Lower Extremity Vessels.

Peliosis hepatis.

CT of Renal arteriovenous malformation.

Development of new CT contrast agents.

Development of new applications for CT contrast materials.

Evaluation of bowel by CT.

Improvement of CT technique for clinical imaging.

Alterations in tumor perfusion in response to treatment.

Living donor evaluation for liver and kidney transplantation.

Radiological mimics of disease.

Mesenteric lymph node and implant detection.

Erdheim Chester disease in the abdomen (Medical Student).

Vascular shunts.

Digital Radiography teaching file.