Meet some students

Research

Research Interests:

My main research interests focus on all aspects of functional tomographic imaging, in particular positron emission tomography (PET) and single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT). Along with my research colleagues in the Department of Radiology at the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS), I study image formation and data acquisition, image processing and correction techniques, image reconstruction, statistical quantification, and objective image-quality assessment.

My work also extends to the multi-variate statistical analysis of pre-clinical imaging data with applications to the evaluation of clinical bio-markers in pharmaceutical development. A current project is the relationship between sample size and signal-to-noise ratio when comparing univariate and multivariate hypothesis testing methods. I am also involved in developing and testing mathematical methods to estimate pharmacokinetic parameters.

I have also been involved in a number of interdisciplinary research projects, including:

  • the development and evaluation of a laser Doppler vibrometer (LDV) for use in medical signal acquisition. The device was invented by a colleague, Dr. Lynn Antonelli, at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport, RI. The LDV is used to measure the blood-pulse waveform of patients.
  • the development of an analytical method for jet fuel quality analysis. The data are derived from Fourier Transform Raman Spectroscopy and Attenuated Total Reflection Infared Spectroscopy. Principal components analysis was applied to differentiate between fuel types.
  • the development of a method to assess actigraph reliability. The data are aquired via wrist actigraphs, which are watch-like devices that measure frequency of movement (FOM) and are used in sleep research. FOM is related to the amount of sleep a subject receives.

I have recently begun to study data mining techniques and the analysis of large data sets, with applications to customer insight in business analytics. My recent work includes regression modeling of a response variable over a set of predictor variables.

Former Students :

John Hoppin, '98

After graduating from Holy Cross, Jack attended the University of Arizona, earning a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics. He then completed a post-doctoral position at the Research Centre Jülich in Germany and subsequently worked as a VP of Development at Bioscan Imaging. He is now a managing Partner at inviCRO LLC, a pre-clinical imaging CRO.

Jack's honors thesis was titled Noise Characterization of Reconstruction Algorithms in Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography. Additionally, he also co-authored the publication Noise Characterization of Block-Iterative Reconstruction Algorithms: II. Monte Carlo Simulations.

Kevin Germino, '01

After graduating from Holy Cross, Kevin enrolled in the Medical Sciences Training Program at Northwestern University. He graduated in 2006 and now works as a physician. He is affiliated with SSM DePaul Health Center.

Kevin's honors thesis was titled Determination of Three-Dimensional Voxel Sensitivity for Two- and Three-headed Coincidence Imaging. Additionally, he also co-authored the publication Three-Dimensional Voxel Sensitivity for Two- and Three-headed Coincidence Imaging.

Candida Desjardins, '07

Didi graduated from Holy Cross in 2007. She is attending medical school at Case Western Reserve University in the Medical Sciences Training Program.

Didi was one of three Fenwick scholars her senior year. Her project was the development, testing, and analysis of a laser Doppler vibrometer, which we used to measure the blood pulse waveform of human subjects.

Didi's Fenwick thesis was titled A Remote and Non-Contact Measurement of the Blood Pulse Waveform with a Laser Doppler Vibrometer. She presented her work at the 2007 SPIE Photonics West Conference in San Jose, CA and published a conference paper titled A remote and non-contact method for obtaining the blood-pulse waveform with a laser Doppler vibrometer.