Abstract: We are developing Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopic Imaging (MRSI) technologies for in vivo cancer biomarker imaging with applications in early detection of cancer treatment responses.  Rapid advances in cancer research has offered many treatment options to cancer patients.  However, individual treatment responses differ dramatically among patients.  Clinically, there is no effective methods to predict therapeutic effect.  Current monitoring of cancer treatment response relies mostly on tumor volume changes, which often takes several months to detect, especially in the presence of pseudo-progression.  To improve cancer imaging specificity, we have recent developed pi-MRSI techniques to resolve overlapping biomarker images, permitting fast spatial mapping of cancer biomarkers with potential clinical translations.  The commercially available MRSI methods are based on the spin echo techniques that apply only to the brain.  In extracranial tissues, the intensive lipid and water signals dominate the proton NMR spectrum, blocking observation of most cancer biomarkers.  Using selective multiple quantum coherence transfer (Sel-MQC) techniques, we have suppressed lipid and water signals in a single-scan, expanding MR biomarker imaging to extracranial tissues.  For applications at high and ultrahigh magnetic field, we have developed zero-quantum MRSI techniques that are insensitive to inhomogeneous broadening due to tissue susceptibility artifacts and poor B₀ shimming.  Various spatial localization schemes have been employed in the Sel-MQC chemical shift imaging (CSI) experiments using Hadamard matrix approach and spatial-spectral RF pulses.  In the novel pi-MRSI methods, 3D biomarker imaging speeds up by hundreds of fold using any currently available fast k-space mapping and multi-slice localization techniques.  By distinguishing tumors specifically from normal tissue, pi-MRSI enables early detection of cancer treatment responses in days rather than months to improve clinical outcome. 

Bio: Dr. Qiuhong He recently joined Purdue faculty in August, 2022.  She earned her PhD in physical chemistry in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH).  Working with Prof. Charles C. Johnson, Jr. in Chapel Hill, she developed the multi-dimensional electrophoretic NMR (ENMR) technology.  Subsequently, she became a postdoctoral research fellow in Princeton University working with Prof. Warren S. Warren.  In Princeton, she discovered the phenomenon of long-range dipolar interactions in solution NMR in her intermolecular multiple quantum conference correlation (iMQCs) experiments.  For biomedical applications of NMR, Dr. He joined the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, working with Prof. Jerry D. Glickson on in vivo NMR of cancer.  She has started to develop cancer biomarker imaging techniques ever since.   

~BME Faculty Host: Dr. Uzay Emir ~

NOTE: Students registered for the seminar are expected to attend in-person.

Zoom link: https://purdue-edu.zoom.us/j/7731446991?pwd=RHdkZTVnRkxTM3J3dnRvY1VLWTlYUT09