Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) is a broad concept that integrates image processing, computer vision, mathematics, physics, and statistics into computerized techniques that assist radiologists in their medical decision-making processes.  Such techniques include the detection of disease and anatomic structures of interest, the classification of lesions, the quantification of disease and anatomic structures (including volumetric analysis, disease progression, and temporal response to therapy), risk assessment, and physiologic evaluation.  Faculty in the Department of Radiology, along with their colleagues in numerous other departments, are conceptualizing and developing novel CAD methodologies.  Active research projects span nearly all imaging modalities (radiography, computed tomography, ultrasound, magnetic resonance imaging, and radionuclide imaging) across a wide-range of anatomic systems (pulmonary, breast, skeletal, cardiac, gastrointestinal, neurologic, vascular, and genitourinary).  These techniques seek to maximize the information that may be extracted from medical images by augmenting radiologists�Esubjective, qualitative interpretation of the displayed images with objective, quantitative computations of the underlying numeric  image data.

The translational components of many of our CAD projects demonstrate the potential impact on patient healthcare represented by this research.  Projects for the computerized assessment of tumor response have matured sufficiently to warrant incorporation into clinical trials for novel chemotherapeutic agents.  The Carl J. Vyborny Translational Laboratory for Breast Imaging Research (VyTL) was recently established to develop and evaluate the clinical effectiveness of new technologies for diagnosing and treating breast cancer in a translational setting; current activities include clinical evaluations of new advances in magnetic resonance imaging and in CAD.

The University of Chicago has more issued CAD patents than any other institution, with more than 70 patents granted or pending.  CAD methods developed by Department of Radiology faculty have been integrated into several CAD systems that either are commercially available or are currently undergoing regulatory approval.

LABS

   Samuel Armato III,  - Armato Lab
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   Kunio Doi - Doi Lab
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   Maryellen Giger - Giger Lab
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   Yulei Jiang - Jiang Lab
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   Robert Nishikawa - Carl J. Vyborny Translational Lab
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   Kenji Suzuki - Suzuki Lab
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