Honors Grants
Ernest Garcia, Ph.D.
Professor of Radiology
Director, Nuclear Cardiology R&D Lab
Emory's Top Innovators & Inventors
Dr. Garcia was chosen as one of four of Emory's Top Innovators and Inventors. In addition to an award ceremony, he will be participating in a moderated discussion concerning “Translating Ideas into Products” on May 8, 2007.
Top 10 of Nuclear Medicine Physicists/Researchers
In the April Issue of Medical Imaging, Dr. Garcia has been voted among the Top 10 of Nuclear Medicine Physicists/Researchers in the industry for the second year in a row. This recognition is a result of a poll of over 600 Medical Imaging readers.
Unni Udayasankar, M.D., research fellow
2007 Executive Council Award
Dr. Unni Udayasankar's paper entitled “Impact of Fat-Suppressed Single Shot Fast Spin Echo T2 Weighted MR Imaging for the Assessment of Crohn's Disease Activity” has been awarded the 2007 Executive Council Award in the ARRS annual Residents in Radiology Awards competition.
Decision Support Systems for MAG3 Renography
Principal Investigator: Andrew Taylor, MD
Co-Investigators: Ernest Garcia, PhD ; Amita Manatunga ; Raghuveer Halkar, MD
Funding Organization: National Institutes of Health (R01)
Our goal is to improve the care of nephro-urology patients by developing new tools (Decision Support Systems) to (1) assist and educate physicians and trainees to appropriately perform and interpret MAG3 renograms and (2) to process, check quality control and actually interpret MAG3 renograms.
Detection of Left Ventricular Dyssynchrony by Cross-Correlation Analysis
Principal Investigator:John Oshinski, PhD
Co-Investigators:Angel Leon, MD;John Merlino, MD;John Carew, PhD;Brandon Fornwalt
Funding Organization: National Institutes of Health (R21)
In thirty percent of patients with severe, drug-refractory heart failure, regional timing of myocardial contraction and relaxation is dyssynchronous. This mechanical dyssynchrony leads to adverse ventricular remodelling, increased mitral regurgitation, and reduced ejection fraction. Cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) is a relatively new treatment for heart failure patients with dyssynchrony that results in both acute hemodynamic benefit as well as improved long-term outcome. Despite CRT showing benefits in many multi-center clinical trials, 30% of patients selected for CRT show no improvement by clinical or echocardiographic endpoints. This poor response rate may in part be explained by limitations of current methods to determine the presence and severity of dyssynchrony.
To overcome the limitations of existing dyssynchrony parameters, we have developed a new mathematical method to calculate a temporal delay between two myocardial tissue velocity profiles acquired with tissue Doppler imaging (TDI). Our method utilizes a function to quantify either systolic, diastolic, or whole-cycle delays using TDI data collected throughout the cardiac cycle. The objectives of this study are to evaluate the ability of our method to: 1) quantify mechanical dyssynchrony in the heart, and 2) predict response to CRT. Preliminary data in a group of young, healthy, normal subjects (negative controls) and known responders to CRT (positive controls) indicate excellent sensitivity and specificity of the methodology. The central hypothesis of this study is that our method of determining dyssynchrony delays is more sensitive and specific in selecting patients who respond to CRT compared to currently utilized methods. To test the hypothesis, we will utilize an existing data set of from a large, multi-center CRT trial.
18F-FACBC PET-CT for the Detection and Staging of Recurrent Prostate Carcinoma
Principal Investigator: David Schuster, MD
Co-Investigators: Dubois Bowman, PhD; Mark Goodman, PhD; Raughveer Halkar, MD; Viraj Master, MD; Peter Nieh, MD; Jonathan Nye, PhD; John Votaw, PhD; Mutta Issa, MD, FACS; Andrew Young, MD, PhD; Carlos Moreno, PhD
Funding Organization: National Institutes of Health (R01)
The general objective of this research is to determine if PET imaging with anti-[18F]FACBC will lead to improved patient care in the diagnosis and staging of prostate cancer and to elucidate the mechanism of its uptake within malignant cells. The specific hypothesis behind this project is that anti-[18F]FACBC PET-CT will detect more local and extraprostatic recurrence than standard conventional imaging, especially compared with [111 I] Indium-capromab-pendetide (ProstaScint).
Investigation of the Environmental and Genetic Basis of Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD) through the Emory NAFLD Research Group: a multidisciplinary project uniting liver experts
Principal Investigators: Diego Martin, MD & Miriam Vos, MD
Co-Investigators: Xiaoping Hu, PhD; Rene Romero, MD; Jennifer Buechner, RD, CSP; Enrique Martinez, MD; James Spivey, MD; Frank Anania, MD; Andy Muir, MD; Mark Bouzyk, PhD; Veda Johnson, MD; Thomas Heffron, MD; Bahig Shehata, MD
Funding Organization: Emory Woodruff Fund
Obesity and liver disease related to NAFLD is highly prevalent and represents a major and growing disease burden in the U.S., including children. The etiology of disease, the factors leading to individual risk and therapy are not yet well understood. This project objective includes the formulation of a comprehensive liver expert multi-disciplinary program to address these problems. Successful implementation and validation of imaging diagnostic technology in pediatric and adult NAFLD patients will allow us to pursue predictive modeling, evaluate the genetic basis of the disease, investigate its cellular-biochemical composition, therapeutic strategies, and facilitate therapy monitoring. Current technology is not suitable for these endeavors.
This study will use MRI/MR spectroscopy to replace the need to biospy liver for diagnosis and monitoring of NAFLD with a more sensitive and specific chemical evaluation of liver lipids.
Leucine Type Amino Acid Transport(LAT) In Gliomas
Principal Investigator: Mark M. Goodman, PhD
Co-Investigators: John Votaw, PhD; Hyunsuk Shim, PhD; Hui Mao, PhD; Daniel Brat, MD, PhD; Jeffrey Olson, MD; David Schuster, MD; Chad Holder, MD
Funding Organization: National Institutes of Health (RO1)
With this grant we will investigate anti-1-amino-3-[18F]fluorocyclobutane-1-carboxylic acid (anti-[18F]FACBC) to image gliomas based upon amino acid transport with PET. Our choice of anti-[18F]FACBC as a suitable radiotracer for imaging tumors stems from our in vitro studies in human U87 glioma cells demonstrating that anti-[18F]FACBC shows high and selective uptake by the LAT and our in vivo studies with anti-[18F]FACBC in humans with primary gliomas (n=11) and metastatic brain tumors (n=15). These studies displayed high 6:1 tumor to brain ratios in support of our proposed studies to evaluate anti-[18F]FACBC in humans in order to determine its potential as an imaging agent for gliomas.
Over the next five years, we expect the following improvements:
1) LAT expression is upregulated in brain tumors in proportion to the growth rate, transport rate and tumor grade
2) anti-[18F]FACBC transport rate in tumor measured prior to and following therapy will correlate to survival
3) anti-[18F]FACBC tumor uptake will provide a more accurate correlation of the extent of the viable tumor distribution compared to MRI
4) anti-[18F]FACBC tumor uptake will provide a more accurate distinction between radiation necrosis and viable tumor than MRI
Tumor Targeting Multi-Functional Magnetic Nanoparticles
Primary Investigators: Dr. Hui Mao & Dr. Lilly Yang
Funding Organization: Emtech Bio (http://www.emtechbio.com/)
Dr. Mao's lab will collaborate with Dr. Lily Yang's lab at WCI and the Department of Surgery to develop multi-functional magnetic nanoparticles for biomarker targeted MRI contrast agent for molecular imaging of cancer, other potential applications of this magnetic nanoparticle platform include magnetic cell labeling, cell purification and drug delivery. Dr. Shuming Nie's lab at Department of BME and Ocean NanoTech, LLC are also participating this research.
Brain Development of Adults Who Survived a Brain Tumor in Childhood
Principal Investigators: Hui Mao, PhD (Emory) Tricia King, PhD (GSU)
Co-Investigators: Chad Holder, MD.; Anna Janss, MD, PhD; Niclolas Krawiecki, MD
Funding Organization: American Cancer Society
This study will use functional MRI (fMRI) and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), along with neuropsychological evolution, to study brain development of adults who survive from the brain tumor in the childhood. The objectives include understanding the effects of bearing brain tumors and treatment to the neurological, psychological and social functions of cancer survivors, and hopefully, to obtain information needed to define approaches to help and improve the quality of the life of cancer survivors.
Planning Grant for an Emory Molecular and Translational Imaging Center
Principal Investigators: Carolyn C. Meltzer, MD; Mark M. Goodman, Ph.D.; Xiaoping Hu, PhD
Co-Investigators: Hui Mao, PhD; Lily Wang, MD, PhD; John Votaw, PhD; Hyunsuk Shim, PhD; David Martin, PhD; Andre Rogatko, PhD; Daniel Brat, PhD
Funding Organization: National Cancer Institute (P20)
The National Cancer Institute has funded a $1.5 million planning grant to establish an Emory Molecular and Translational Imaging Center (EMTIC). We envision EMTIC as a unique cross-disciplinary scientific, administrative, and educational network that encompasses the growing community of imaging scientists and basic and clinician scientists working in areas vital to cancer diagnosis and therapeutics. EMTIC will build on institutional and regional strengths in imaging technology, drug discovery, nanotechnology, and growth of the Winship Cancer Institute (WCI) to optimize communication and collaboration among faculty and trainees from diverse yet synergistic fields relevant to cellular and molecular imaging, with a focus on imaging biomarker development, validation, and translation.
X-Ray Scatter Correction for Breast CT
Principal Investigators: Srinivasan Vedantham, PhD
Co-Investigators: Andrew Karellas, Ph.D; Sankararaman Suryanarayanan, PhD, MBA; Ioannis Sechopoulos, MS; Carl J. D’Orsi, MD
Funding Agency: Georgia Cancer Coalition
This research is aimed at exploring certain physical processes such as x-ray scatter that affect image quality in dedicated computed tomography of the breast.