Sandy Napel

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My primary interests are in developing diagnostic and therapy-planning applications and strategies for the acquisition, visualization and interpretation of multi-dimensional medical imaging data. Examples are: creation of three-dimensional images of blood vessels using CT, visualization of complex flow within blood vessels using MR, computer-aided detection and characterization of lesions (e.g., colonic polyps, pulmonary nodules) from cross-sectional image data, visualization and automated assessment of 4D ultrasound data, and fusion of images acquired using different modalities (e.g., CT and MR). I have also been involved in developing and evaluating techniques for exploring cross-sectional imaging data from an internal perspective, i.e., virtual endoscopy (including colonoscopy, angioscopy, and bronchoscopy), and in the quantitation of structure parameters, e.g., volumes, lengths, medial axes, and curvatures. Finally, I am also interested in creating workable solutions to the problem of "data explosion," i.e., how to look at the thousands of images generated per examination using modern CT and MR scanners.