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Newsletter - 2022 Fall Edition October 2022

You have been waiting for it... HealthTech is finally launching its information newsletter! Find below all the recent news of the Institute, from research to training, calendar, main events, call for proposals and many more.

Edito
A brand new newsletter

After pouring blood, sweat and tears, HealthTech is glad to announce the launching of their much-awaited newsletter! This fall newsletter is the first of what is expected to be a trimestrial release of hot topics.

If you have received this email, it means that you are considered as part of the HealthTech consortium: permanent researcher, professor, PhD student, Master student or alumni. Do not hesitate to transfer this newsletter to anyone who might be interested. If unfortunately, you see no interest in this trimestrial newsletter, please first give us a chance, or unsubscribe below.

 

In order to provide you with the most up-to-date information possible, please send us all your news on a regular basis, it will be our pleasure to share them:

  • new scientific publications
  • involvement in outreach events, summer schools & other events, whether cohesive or scientific
  • new incoming members
  • recent PhD and HDR defenses
  • fundings & well-deserved awards
  • etc.

Save the date
HealthTech Day 2022

Daniel Baumgartner presenting his latest work at the HealthTech Day 2021 - credit: A. Hostettler

The second annual "HealthTech day" will be held on Monday, December 12th, 2022 (approx. 9:00am - 04:00pm).

The program, under preparation, will include scientific seminars throughout the day and a lunch buffet. This will be a great opportunity for HealthTech members to meet and initiate close collaborations between teams working in different fields, therefore launching novel interactions to prepare for HealthTech's next call for interdisciplinary research proposals.

The previsionnal scientific program is as follows:

  • short activity report by HealthTech's coordinator
  • two plenary lectures
  • a blitz session for PhD students
  • a poster session
  • 6 conferences by HealthTech scientists

 

Register here before November 5th

Research
Call for proposals

Check your inbox, as we are about to send all permanent members brand new information concerning funding opportunities!

  • Functioning support for research projects in terms of platform service
  • Opportunities for interdisciplinary seed projects funding on a rolling basis (submissions accepted on a continuous basis)

Don't miss out!

 

 

Research
TechnoFUS Lab - LabCom

Following the 2021 ANR call for proposals related to the "Common laboratories" program (LabCom), the TechnoFUS-Lab, dedicated to new technologies for ultrasound therapies, was awarded funding. This call for proposals was meant to support scientific researchers in academia in the co-construction of research laboratories, conjointly with companies, favoring long-term partnerships and the development of knowledge, therefore promoting innovation benefiting to both partners.
 

The TechnoFUS Laboratory focuses on new technologies for ultrasound therapies, and emerged from a collaboration between the ICube laboratory (Laboratory of Engineering science, Computer science and Imaging) and the company Image Guided Therapy (Pessac, France), specializing in image-guided ultrasound therapy devices. In order to face the technological challenges related to ultrasound therapies, the TechnoFUS Lab relies on the expertise of:

The TechnoFUS Laboratory is co-directed by Dr Jonathan Vappou, CNRS scientist and HealthTech member, and Dr Erik Dumont, CEO of Image Guided Therapy.
 

Check out TechnoFUS Lab's website

Training
Our MSc program expands

Incoming Master students

Ten 2nd year MSc fellows: A new class of incoming second year Master students joined the HealthTech program for this academic year. These 10 fellows, from Spain, Italy, Brazil & France, all have different backgrounds, from biomedical engineering to plastic engineering or medecine. Since our training program includes a significant amount of time in research institutes, all 10 fellows have already selected the research project that they will be pursuing individually throughout the course of the year.

Check out this year's selected Master research projects


Seven 1st year MSc fellows: A 1st year HealthTech Master track also opened in September 2022. This track was deemed necessary in order to offer the most suitable training program for MSc candidates with very heterogenous backgrounds. The 7 selected fellows - from Nigeria, Colombia, Turkey & Brazil - will be able to choose from a broad spectrum of disciplinary courses, supplemented by group projects and a research-based approach to teaching.

 

Graduation ceremony

After a year enrolled in our program, our first class of Master fellows finally graduated, and we couldn't be more proud. Out of our 14 graduates, 7 are confirmed to stay in Strasbourg, either for their PhD (5) or to pursue as research engineers (2). At least two graduates also had the great opportunity to pursue a PhD in another location. We wish them all the best of luck in their future endeavors!

 

Picture of the graduation ceremony for the class of 2022
Graduation ceremony - credit: Adnan Saood
Picture of the graduation ceremony for the class of 2022
Graduation ceremony - credit: Adnan Saood
Picture of the graduation ceremony for the class of 2022
Graduation ceremony - credit: C. Wenger & TPS

Research
PhD funding

Credit: B. Bayle, J. Garnon & L. Meylheuc
Left: axial kVCT of a head and neck patient with a 50 cm FOV. Right: axial MVCT of the same patient, with a 39 cm FOV. Property of ICANS - Credit: P. Meyer, D. Antoni & A. Lallement

This year's HealthTech call for PhD proposals led to the financial support of six (6) outstanding doctoral projects. Some of the selected projects are co-funded by partner organisms, that we hereby acknowledge:

  • Doctoral School of Mathematics, Computer Science and Engineering
  • ANR project "ArtIC"
  • IHU Strasbourg
  • Management of Creativity Chair (Fondation Université de Strasbourg)
     

Topics range from artificial intelligence and data science to mechanics, medical physics and image processing:

  • Hand fracture surgical video analysis for AI-based training and surgical safety
  • Multiscale mechanical model for skeletal muscle using homogenization approach coupling imaging, modeling and genetic expression
  • Deep learning based medical image outpainting for adaptive radiotherapy
  • Robust intra-cell semantic segmentation for quantifying metastasis stages
  • Patient-specific study of the internal cemented screws for the pelvis metastasis
  • University hospital institutes (IHU) : a new paradigm for innovation in the health sector?
     

Learn more about this year's funded PhD projects

Focus on
SDS Summer School

Recognizing the importance of data science for surgery and the need for effective clinical translation, IHU Strasbourg and the University of Strasbourg successfully organized the first ever Surgical Data Science (SDS) Summer School, held from July 18th to 22nd. The organizing committee was made of: Pietro Mascagni, Alexandros Karargyris, Vinkle Srivastav, Silvana Perretta & Nicolas Padoy. HealthTech was a proud sponsor of the event, along with Labex CAMI (Computer assisted medical interventions),  Medtronic & Intuitive Surgical.

This first school focused on endoscopic video analysis, and consisted in a series of lectures, hands-on labs and group projects. Leading clinical and computers science experts from top institutions covered subjects related to the clinical use of endoscopy and endoscopic video analysis, spanning from endoscopic instruments and data annotations all the way to advanced deep learning algorithms and the design of clinical translation studies.

With strong international interest, 12 surgeons & 12 computer scientists were selected to attend this intensive 5-day summer camp. Attendees had the unique opportunity to work in a truly multidisciplinary environment and get hands-on experience in cutting-edge data science tools and state-of-the-art clinical platforms from top experts in the fields of computer science and surgery. The school was carefully designed to bridge the gap between surgeons & computer scientists and thus educate the future generations of experts on the value of data science for surgery.

Great news: due to its massive success, the summer school is already planned for 2023!

Stay tuned on the SDS summer school website

 

Thomas Lampert, Chair of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence at the University of Strasbourg and HealthTech member

HDR defense
Thomas Lampert

Thomas Lampert, Chair of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence at the University of Strasbourg and HealthTech member, successfully defended his HDR on July 4th, 2022. The research work he presented was entitled "Sustainability in Artificial Intelligence: Recycling Data and Reducing Model Waste". His research focuses on domain invariance, i.e. increasing the generalisability and reusability of machine learning models, and reducing the need for annotated data. Currently his main application areas are medical imaging and remote sensing.

HDR committee

  • Pierre Gançarski, Professor, ICube, Scientific Guarantor
  • Sébastien Lefèvre, Professor, IRISA, Reviewer
  • Michèle Sebag, Director of Research, CNRS (LRI), Reviewer
  • Nicolas Thome, Professor, CEDRIC, Reviewer
  • Antoine Cornuéjols, Professor, AgroParisTech, Examiner
  • Nicolas Padoy, Professor, IHU/ICube, Examiner
  • Cédric Wemmert, Professor, ICube, Examiner