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AI-powered precision medicine: Advancing early detection and diagnosis
Dr. Teresa Wu is a noted trailblazer in medical technology powered by AI, serving as the founding co-director of the ASUMayo Center for Innovative Imaging. In that role, she helps create better screening systems for many medical conditions including kidney and neurodegenerative diseases.
As a professor of industrial engineering in the School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence (SCAI), Wu guides students of all levels through research projects that seek to provide better tools for the early detection of Alzheimer’s disease The work uses AI to harmonize PET scans taken with different types of tracers. Since there are five different FDA-approved tracers, all with different properties, and different clinics use different tracers, it can be hard for researchers to compare data.
The team’s models show what a brain scan taken using one type of tracer would look like if it had been taken with a different one, enabling easier comparison and research.
Another project underway in the Wu Lab uses AI and deep machine learning systems to estimate a patient’s biological age from their MRI brain scans.
“With healthy subjects you expect their biological age and their true age to be similar,” Wu says.
If the two ages don’t match, that could be an early warning sign of neurodegenerative disease.
Wu is currently co-developing a pioneering program to train doctoral students for the future of medical engineering that harnesses the power of AI.
Written by Kelly deVos.
