VASC Seminar Announcement
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Date: Monday, 10/25/99
Time: 3:30-4:30
Place: Smith Hall 2nd Floor Common Area

Speaker:  George Stetten
          CMU Robotics Institute
          http://www.stetten.com

Title: Analysis and Visualization of Real Time 3D Ultrasound

Abstract:

Identification and measurement of objects in 3D images can be automatic, 
rapid and stable, based on local shape properties derived statistically 
from populations of medial primitives sought throughout the image space.  
These shape properties, measured at medial locations within the object, 
include scale, orientation, endness, and medial dimensionality.  Medial 
dimensionality is a local shape property differentiating sphere, 
cylinder, and slab, with intermediate dimensionality also possible. 
Endness is a property found at the cap of a cylinder or the edge of a slab.
  
These technique can be applied to a wide variety of imaging modalities.  
My present application involves automated detection and measurement of 
the left ventricular axis in vivo using Real-Time Three Dimensional 
(RT3D) echocardiography.   In this talk, I will review the peculiarities 
due to ultrasound's physics and coordinate system, which present 
significant challenges in analyzing RT3D ultrasound data and visualizing 
slices for manual segmentation.

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George Stetten graduated in Engineering and Applied Physics from Harvard 
in 1976, received an MS in Biology/Computing from NYU in 1986, received 
an MD from the SUNY Syracuse in 1991, and spent a year as a research 
resident in Radiology at Duke.  His PhD research at UNC Chapel Hill 
involved the automated analysis of cardiac images using Real-Time 3D 
ultrasound, a new imaging modality he helped develop while an Assistant 
Research Professor in Biomedical Engineering at Duke.  His background as 
an engineering includes having developed the software for the first 
onboard computer system for Deep Submersible Alvin, and a telemetric egg 
for studying incubation of endangered birds at the Bronx Zoo.  He 
developed the first classroom ever in which laptop computers were linked 
with diffuse infrared light.  He is the recipient of an NIH Clinical 
Investigator Development Award and a Whitaker Biomedical Engineering 
Grant.  Dr. Stetten is currently a Research Scientist at the Robotics 
Institute at Carnegie Mellon University and an Assistant Professor in 
Bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh.