Description:

JANUARY MEETING: Wednesday, January 26, 2022 at 5:15pm (US Central) via Zoom.

DATA SCIENCE NIGHTS are monthly talks on data science techniques or applications, organized by Northwestern University graduate students and scholars. Aspiring, beginning, and advanced data scientists are welcome!

AGENDA:

5:15: Data Science Night Meet & Greet on Zoom: https://northwestern.zoom.us/j/97300898035
5:30: Presentation by Qian Cao on Zoom
6:00: Post-talk coding on Gather Town

SPEAKER: Qian Cao, Visiting Scientist, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

TITLE: Turning a bone imaging research project into a job at the FDA

ABSTRACT: 1 in 5 American women over age 50 has osteoporosis, which increases the risk of bone fracture and can lead to hospitalizations and premature death in older people. Assessment of bone fragility is a key part of staging and management of osteoporosis. Bone mineral density (BMD) is commonly used for evaluating fracture risk and can be measured by quantitative computed tomography (CT) or dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA). However, bone fragility also depends on both mineral distribution and microstructure. Therefore, recent efforts have emphasized characterization of bone microarchitecture (or bone texture) as a basis for more reliable estimates of fragility and disease progression. I will briefly discuss my research in measurement of bone microstructure and development of texture biomarkers in CT. I will also discuss my experience as a research fellow at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

BIO: Qian Cao is a Visiting Scientist at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) where he works on projects involving assessment of bone health. He completed his PhD in 2020 in the Dept of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, where he developed new 3D imaging and reconstruction methods to visualize bone at higher resolution, as well as new analysis methods. Following graduation, he worked at the FDA for almost a year as a research fellow on developing texture biomarkers for the assessment of bone health.

For more info: data-science-nights.org

Supporting Groups:

This event is supported by the Northwestern Institute for Complex Systems and the Northwestern Data Science Initiative.