Insigneo Newsletter Spring 2015 - Showcase Edition

Issue 1: Spring 2015 “THE SHOWCASE EDITION”

BIG DATA

PROJECT NEWS

EVENTS ROUNDUP

CONTENTS

04 News

Events & Awards

Inside Issue 1

07 Introducing...

Polaris 08

Project Focus VIRTUheart

10

The Feature Big Data

12

Researcher Focus Damien Lacroix

10

16 Showcase

Timetable 18

VPH Institute Adriano Henney

The Pam Liversidge Building Sir Frederick Mappin Building Mappin Street Sheffield S1 3JD

07

12

+44 (0) 114 222 0162 /5 /7 info@insigneo.org www.insigneo.org @insigneo Cover: “Stem cells on a biomaterial with hierarchical porosity.”

Robert Owen, PhD student, Materials Science.

Supervisors; Reilly, Lacroix, Bellantuono and Claeyssens.

With thanks to Dr. Nicola Green of the Kroto Imaging Facility.

2 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

08

THE INSIGNEO TEAM BASED IN THE PAM LIVERSIDGE BUILDING

Welcome Insigneo: a coalition of the willing. When we explain how Insigneo works, we frequently use the expression “coalition of the willing”. In spite of being hijacked by the Bush administration for the first Iraq war, I think it is a beautiful expression. It means that we work together by choice, that we share effort and resources to the extent each of us sees appropriate.

But there is another expression that is very important: “united we stand, divided we fall”. I am fully aware that the archetypical academic could be described as individualist and anarchic; it comes with the territory. But current trends regarding higher education in the UK, especially in relation to research, suggest clearly that universities need

to focus, ensuring that most of their research falls into a small number of public narratives. This allows an institution to be recognised as a national leader in a particular area.

So we need to close ranks and make our shared vision of a predictive medicine strong and articulated. Our annual Showcase is the perfect occasion to reinforce this coalition, to establish new collaborations, understand better what others within Insigneo do and get more involved in its governance and in the development of shared resources.

“Divided we fall, Insigneo we stand.”

Professor Marco Viceconti, Executive Director Insigneo May 2015

INSIGNEO NEWS

“Our annual Showcase is the perfect occasion to reinforce this coalition and to establish new collaborations” ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

3

NEWS

News Roundup

Major highlights from all the Insigneo projects, students and researchers Bursary

collaboration

Sheffield Hospitals Charity has partnered with the Insigneo Institute to fund four innovative research projects that bring together clinicians from the Sheffield Teaching Hospitals with researchers from the University of Sheffield in order to use the latest research methodologies to address clinical needs.

between

Sheffield

Hospitals

The programme, which has just entered its third round, is funding three six-month bursaries and one threeyear PhD scholarship. The successful projects were chosen for their potential to impact clinical practice and improve patient experience. For a full list of the successful bursaries, see www.insigneo.org

Charity

and

Insigneo

L-R: P. LAWFORD, D. REYNOLDS & H. SHENTON

£1.3m for research into brain blood transport

PROFESSOR EASTELL WITH HIS AWARD

Insigneo

members’

awards

Congratulations to Insigneo members Professor Richard Eastell and Dr. Gwendolen Reilly for their notable achievements. Professor Eastell was awarded the Frederic C. Bartter Award for outstanding clinical investigation in disorders of bone and mineral metabolism.

Richard becomes one of only two 4 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

and

achievements

people working in the UK in the past 26 years to be awarded this most important accolade for clinical research into bone disease. Dr. Reilly was elected as President of the European Society of Biomechanics and becomes the first woman - as well as the third Insigneo member - to hold the role.

Insigneo member Professor Alex Frangi, of CISTIB at the University of Sheffield has been awarded an EPSRC grant worth £1.3m to characterise and quantify early differential alteration in brain blood transport with a novel MRI technique.

The OCEAN project will draw on techniques of neuropathology, neuroimaging and biophysics to identify biomarkers of disease onset and progression to better understand the effects of various drugs and treatments.

View the MySpine project video at www.insigneo.org

System to support treatment of back pain developed A clinical support system which will help clinicians treat patients with lower back pain has been developed thanks to research conducted in association with the Insigneo Institute for in silico medicine. The MySpine™ software system combines MR and CT images to generate personalised models of the lower spine. Using state-ofthe-art in silico methods, three potential treatment options - discectomy, spinal fusion and a conservative treatment such as physiotherapy - can be virtually trialled. By simulating an ageing process, the impact of each treatment can be accurately assessed. Once validated for clinical use, this information will aid clinicians in choosing the best treatment for patients with lower back pain - a condition which affects up to 80% of the population at some point in their lives.

The €4m EC-funded project, which ran from 2011 to late 2014, met for its final technical meeting on 26th and 27th August 2014 in Buxton, near Sheffield.

Representatives from each of the seven project partners met in the Chatsworth Room at the Palace Hotel, Buxton to evaluate the complex technical outputs and to discuss the work that will be taken forward into clinical practice.

The results have been very impressive and highly encouraging. The project has identified key characteristics that seem to offer clinically-relevant insights into the consequences of different interventions for the future health of patients, and the work to exploit these outputs will now be taken further; it is hoped that the MySpine™ software system will be helping patients lead better lives before too long.

INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

MySpine™ will aid clinicians to select the best treatment for lower back pain - a condition which effects up to 80% of the population SPRING 2015

5

EVENTS

Events

Out and about with Insigneo

1

1. Enjoying the views in Rome with the Avicenna Project 2. Creative brainstorming at the MultiSim Workshop 3. Gwen Reilly taking over as President of the European Society of Biomechanics 4. Fundraising cakes at the MacMillan coffee morning 5.

The Insigneo General Assembly 6. Taking a break at the Christmas lunch

4

2

3 6

5 6 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

INTRODUCING

POLARIS £7.5 million award is taking state-of-the-art lung research to the next level

World leading lung research, undertaken at the University of Sheffield and associated with the Insigneo Institute, has received a welcome boost of £7.5 million from the Medical Research Council and British Heart Foundation. The grant will help the POLARIS project, led by Professor Jim Wild of the Academic Unit of Radiology - and Insigneo member, expand its groundbreaking image acquisition and processing facilities in Sheffield, turning the UK into the leading nation in the area of diagnostic pulmonary medicine. The award is part of a £230 million grant for technologies, announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, in October 2014.

Professor Wild’s Pulmonary, Lung and Respiratory Imaging Sheffield (POLARIS) project uses stateof-the-art techniques to produce highly detailed images of patients’ lungs, without relying on radiation. By using hyperpolarised gases, the POLARIS team creates functional images of the lungs of patients affected by conditions such as smoking, cystic fibrosis, emphysema, pulmonary hypertension and asthma.

The images, which are more detailed than those created using conventional methods, are created when a patient inhales a small amount of a noble

gas, such as Helium-3 or Xenon-129. Using high power lasers, the gases are hyperpolarised in a process called ‘optical pumping’. The MRI images can then be used to help clinicians identify early signs of lung disease and other lung conditions.

Several technical barriers, such as the ease of polarisation of the gases and the additional hardware required for the MRI scanners, still need to be overcome before this technology can become routinely used in the clinic.

Professor Wild said: “this grant will allow continued research into MRI scanner hardware and image acquisition methods and their clinical translation, ensuring Sheffield and the UK lead in this important area of diagnostic pulmonary medicine. The new image processing laboratory will allow us to process large volumes of digital imaging data for phenotyping pulmonary diseases together with computational modelling approaches, which are being pioneered in the Insigneo Institute for in silico medicine.”

A pair of healthy lungs (L) and a pair effected by smoking (R) INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

7

PROJECT FOCUS

VIRTUheart

Technology developed in association with Insigneo will help ease the burden on patients undergoing assessment for coronary artery disease Going into hospital for a procedure is never pleasant. At best, it is an inconvenience, at worst, undergoing surgery or even an assessment can be anxiety inducing, uncomfortable, invasive and often leave the patient needing a lengthy period of recovery.

Anything which can be done to reduce this burden - on the patient, but also on hospital resources - is a welcome development.

VIRTUheart, a research project coordinated by the University of Sheffield and affiliated to the Insigneo Institute, has developed technology to improve the process for patients 8 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

undergoing assessment for coronary artery disease. By replacing an invasive procedure - which involves inserting a wire into the patient’s artery - with in silico methods, the VIRTUheart technology ensures the process is safer for the patient. By avoiding the administration of drugs with potentially unpleasant side effects, it also ensures that the procedure is easier for the patient to endure. It is good news for hospital accountants too, as the improved technique reduces the cost of the procedure, both by eliminating the need for additional hardware and significantly reducing the time to conduct the assessment.

By replacing an invasive procedure with in silico methods, VIRTUheart ensures the process is safer for the patient.

Dr Paul Morris, a cardiology doctor from Sheffield Teaching Hospitals, who works on the VIRTUheart project explains: “VIRTUheart provides important clinical information for doctors when making decisions about how to treat coronary artery disease.

It computes intra-coronary physiology and virtual fractional flow reserve (vFFR) from angiogram images of the coronary arteries. It does this by using the ANSYS-CFX computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software to calculate changes in blood pressure, which occur within diseased coronary arteries, rather than relying upon measurement with an invasive intracoronary pressure wire.”

predict, with 97% accuracy, compared to previous methods, which patients required coronary revascularisation, by stent or surgery and, importantly, which did not. VIRTUheart now aims to widen its test cases and make its system more user friendly, in preparation for a large multi-centre clinical trial. The VIRTU-2 study is collecting data from 100 more patients with coronary artery disease. These patients have more complex coronary disease and will help to develop a useful tool for physicians to use in ‘real-world’ cases. The further cases will also help us to develop the novel individual-patient-tuning system which will improve accuracy on a case by case basis.

Despite relying on complex mathematical modelling to provide physiological and anatomical information about diseased coronary arteries, the VIRTUheart technology is designed to be used by clinicians in everyday consultations. As such, it effectively automates a number of advanced computation, modelling and simulation processes, so that all that is needed to use VIRTUheart is an angiogram. Dr Morris says: “We want this tool to be used by clinicians, so it needs to be simple and intuitive. It can’t be reliant on computer scientists.”

Allowing for the completion of this study and the trial of the system, Dr Morris estimates that the technology is about three years from clinical use. Having worked at the juncture of research and healthcare, he has an informed position on the challenges of translating one to the other: “Projects aiming for clinical translation need to focus on what is useful to the clinician, not the scientist.

This is why collaborations between the NHS and academic institutions, just like VIRTUheart Insigneo are so important. Often clinical simulations of medicine does not require what scientists coronary arteries or engineers might consider to be very Projects aiming high levels of model accuracy. Instead, knowing the level of uncertainty for a for clinical particular result might be just as useful. translation need Ultimately, a model which demonstrates to focus on promise requires a clinical trial in what is useful order to encourage uptake and clinical to the clinician, adoption. This is what we are aiming for not the scientist. with our research.”

The work of VIRTUheart is at the forefront of the ambition of the Insigneo Institute as it represents the realisation of the translation of academic research to clinically useful tools. Already tested on an initial study of 20 patients, it was able to

INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

9

FEATURE

Big Data Insigneo members Richard Clayton, Andrew Narracott and Steven Wood discuss the importance of Big Data for in silico medicine

The ability to combine healthcare records with lifestyle data has the potential to deliver a highly personalised representation of an individual, which would enable targeted and patient specific interventions and therapy.

10 INSIGNEO NEWS

What is Big Data?

Smartphones, tablets and other devices allow us to record and publish increasing amounts of information, and the amount of data in the world continues to increase exponentially, doubling every 18 months. Making sense of huge quantities of data to predict trends and behaviour is an enormous challenge for corporations including Google and Facebook, and the tools for management and analysis of these data are known as Big Data.

These data change rapidly, and timely analysis of trends is important.

Typically data are not stored in a single location, but distributed over many sites, with analytical processes running independently on multiple data instances to return an aggregated outcome. Recently, these concepts have been extended to the analysis of data from a range of diverse sources, including social media and healthcare.

Why is managing Big Data relevant for healthcare and Insigneo?

The ability to combine healthcare records with lifestyle data from social media and mobile devices has the potential to deliver a highly personalised representation of an individual, which would enable targeted, patient specific interventions

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

and therapy. The combination of Big Data techniques, which capture emerging trends, when the nature of the underlying processes cannot be determined with existing in silico approaches, has the potential to deliver tools that provide a more personalised prediction of outcomes for the patient and enhance the stratification of treatment decisions.

To realise this potential requires a considered approach to data management: to leverage the most powerful analytical methods our data must be well organised from the point at which it is collected or created. In the healthcare domain these requirements bring together the formality required by informatics with the diversity associated with the complexity of the human body and the derived information we use to assess pathophysiology and aid diagnosis and treatment. Whilst information technologies are continually being developed to address even these demanding requirements, successful application of these technologies to healthcare presents a challenge for future research.

What are the challenges and how are we going to meet them?

Our vision for big data in healthcare is exciting, but poses significant challenges.

HEALTHCARE RECORDS

LIFESTYLE DATA

Many of the small-scale biological processes that underlie disease have a stochastic component; there are uncertainties and errors associated with measurements made in the clinic; and many clinical records will have missing data as well as information that is ambiguous and difficult for a computer to interpret. On top of these practical challenges, the increasing volume and complexity of measured data presents a significant challenge, particularly in the area of genomics.

Clearly we are not going to overcome these challenges all at once. Our strategy for Big Data in Insigneo is to develop infrastructure to support research, that includes appropriate design of analytical workflows to ensure the most efficient use of both storage and computational resources. It is important for us to adhere to the ethical and governance standards associated with handling healthcare data, and this aspect is critical to the success of initial research effort and its translation into clinical practice. The partnership between the University and STH, and the inter-sectoral nature of Insigneo membership, provides a solid foundation for fundamental research to be aligned with the requirements of clinical services.

Finally, integration of education and training in Big Data techniques with

PERSONALISED MODELS

PATIENT SPECIFIC TREAMENT

existing research-led teaching of in silico medicine is essential to ensure the next generation of researchers have the skills to excel within the complex domain of biomedical data-driven simulation.

Where might we be in 5 years time?

Looking forward, we expect to remove the barriers between the researcher and state-of-the-art computational infrastructure and analytical methods, which operate over data from the level of the individual to the population as a whole. This will allow computational workflows to be informed by, and contribute to, an evolving body of curated scientific data, which continually refines our understanding of human pathophysiology. A common data infrastructure for academic and clinical researchers, in accordance with appropriate governance, will allow physicians to draw on a broader evidence base than ever before to inform their choice of treatment. We expect the development of personalised approaches to healthcare assessment, diagnosis, stratification and intervention to increasingly rely on a Big Data infrastructure, and we look forward to delivering real benefits by improving the efficiency of healthcare delivery and better healthcare provision to the general public.

INSIGNEO NEWS

18 months

Time taken for amount of data in the world to double

Our vision for big data in healthcare is exciting, but poses significant challenges.

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

11

RESEARCHER

Researcher Spotlight: Damien Lacroix What is your current role?

As one of the Chairs appointed as part of the creation of Insigneo, I see my role as contributing to the development of the Institute and making it world-leading in the new area of in silico medicine. As Director of Research my aim is to increase the research portfolio of the Institute and enhance internal collaboration within the University and between the many different academics who have some interest in the development of in silico medicine.

What are you working on at the moment?

My main research interest is understanding the effect of mechanical loading onto the body. In other words, how our daily physical activity is translated into a series of mechanical stimuli, which are applied to our bodies at different anatomical scales - the organ, tissue, cellular and molecular levels. Since we are constantly doing activities, a better understanding of the influence of loading can enable us to prevent diseases and create personalised rehabilitation programmes in the treatment of neuromusculoskeletal diseases.

Having recently concluded the EC funded MySpine project, what were its outcomes and what did it prove about 12 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

the usefulness of in silico modelling in healthcare?

During this project we were able to compare the effect of different surgical treatments on lower back pain and advise on the best treatment for individual patients. We were able to predict in a clinical cohort of 200 patients, whether it is better for them to receive pain killers or undergo a surgical treatment. For the first time, an integrated software platform could be operated within a real clinical environment, to help the surgeon make the best decision to treat a given patient. This project was a powerful indicator of how in silico modelling can help in the clinical decision process and therefore improve the treatment of diseases.

You have recently started the EPSRCFrontier funded project MultiSim, what does this project hope to achieve?

This award focuses on the establishment of a currently non-existent but essential computational platform for the management of musculoskeletal disorders. A generic modelling framework that involves multi-scale modelling, unobservable states and variables, and uncertainty will be designed to address various neuromusculoskeletal disorders.

I see my role as contributing to the development of the Institute and making it world leading in the new area of in silico medicine

Damien Lacroix is Professor of Mechanobiology in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. He has a first degree in Mechanical Engineering from the National Institute of Applied Science (INSA Lyon, France) and is Director of Research for the Insigneo Institute.

How significant is the establishment of the Insigneo Institute in Sheffield?

The Insigneo Institute is unique in its kind. The integration of modellers and experimentalists within the same place, with the active involvement of clinicians makes this Institute one of the largest and most integrated research institutes in the world devoted to the use of in silico methods for the diagnosis, prognosis, treatment planning and monitoring of diseases in the areas of neuromusculoskeletal, cardiovasculorespiratory, neurosciences and oncology. Insigneo hosts some of the main players of the VPH Community and therefore the Institute is able to act at all levels of in silico medicine going from pre-clinical testing, clinical phase trial, software deployment and data sharing within the hospital to clinical assessment and monitoring of VPH tools. No one else can achieve such integration.

When not working on in silico models, how do you unwind?

Family and photography are my two main activities outside work. I love going to the Peak Discrict for a walk with my son and wife and taking pictures.

To read the full interview see www.insigneo.org INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

13

LAB FOCUS

InSIDE INSIGNEO Inside Sheffield University’s Pam Liversidge Building, Insigneo’s state-of-the-art laboratories are enabling us to be at the cutting edge of in silico research.

14 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

Insigneo Laboratories C+ Floor, Pam Liversidge Building The C+ laboratory is a unique environment with specialised equipment, which allows our researchers to work across the range of anatomical scales - organ, tissue, cellular and molecular - when conducting musculoskeletal research. The brand new laboratory is fitted with PCR machines, large mechanical testing machines to compress bone and cells, fluorescence microscopes, atomic force microscopes and more.

INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

15

TIMETABLE

Showcase Timetable

Welcome to the Insigneo Showcase. What will you discover?

Insigneo & Big Data - Why do we Care?

10.05, Professor Richard Clayton

Richard Clayton will introduce the topic of Big Data, and explain why the storage and management of large amounts of different types of data is important for Insigneo.

Collecting Contextualised Behavioural Data using everyday Technology 10.15, Professor Fabio Ciravegna

Prof. Dr. Fabio Ciravegna is Professor of Language and Knowledge Technologies and Head of OAK Group in the Department of Computer Science. His research focuses on Information and Knowledge Management, in his talk he will discuss how we can leverage everyday technologies to collect contextualised behavioural data for research purposes.

POLARIS - Polarised and Respiatory Imaging Sheffield 10.30, Professor Jim Wild

Professor Jim Wild introduces POLARIS - one of Insigneo’s flagship projects. The team behind POLARIS are using state-of-the-art techniques developed in Sheffield to create functional images of the lungs in patients affected by conditions such as smoking, cystic fibrosis, emphysema, pulmonary hypertension and asthma.

The Big Data Panel Debate

11.10, Professor Chris Newman

How can we balance the privacy concerns surrounding the use of Big Data with its potential for public good?

Chaired by Chris Newman, Professor of Clinical Cardiology at the University of Sheffield, this discussion is designed to illuminate some of the most pressing 16 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

issues surrounding Big Data and its use in medicine today. The panel members are: Pat Lawford, Basil Sharrack, Mark Taylor, Wendy Tindale, Marco Viceconti and Steven Wood.

The Emergence of Computer Aided BioEngineering

13.35, Steve Levine, Dassault Systemes

By its very nature, Bioengineering is a complex intersection of multiple disciplines, applying engineering principles to biological systems. DS SIMULIA’s Chief Strategy Officer, Steve Levine will introduce the Living Heart Project and discuss its unique approach to overcoming these challenges.

What a Difference a Donor Makes

14.10, David Reynolds, Sheffield Hospitals Charity

David Reynolds is the Director of the Sheffield Hospitals Charity, the official NHS Charity serving all the NHS Foundation Trusts in Sheffield. The Charity invests between £2-3m annually to make life better for patients in Sheffield. David will talk about the Charity’s partnership with Insigneo and the impact it makes through its grant making and fundraising activities across South Yorkshire.

VPH-Share

15.40, Professor Rod Hose

After four years of work, VPH-Share is ready to launch. The online portal is designed to allow users to quickly develop computational workflows. These chains of processing tasks allow raw medical information to be refined into meaningful diagnostic information. By automating over half the tasks associated with workflow construction, simple workflows can be running within minutes.

Insigneo Abstracts:

POLARIS: POLARISED IMAGING

Our cutting edge science Browse our posters and hear oral presentations from the best of Insigneo’s cutting-edge research.

From more than 50 submissions, from both Insigneo members and students working in association with the Institute, this selection is designed to give you a flavour of our multi-disciplinary work.

MULTISIM: FRONTIER ENGINEERING

Insigneo Project Stands:

Up close with our research Discover more about our research expertise: get hands-on with VPH-Share’s computing infrastructure; see examples of gait analysis at the MultiSim stand and learn about how they are developing a multiscale hyper modelling framework; and much more…

8.45 09.30 10.00 10.45 11.05 12.30 13.30 14.05 14.45 15.10 15.35 16.00 16.15

Facilities and Education:

VPH-SHARE: SHARING FOR HEALTHCARE

Arrival, Registrations and Coffee Welcome Session 1 Coffee Break Session 2 - Panel Debate Lunch Session 3 - Industry Perspective Session 4 Coffee Break Session 5 Session 6 Closing Remarks Exhibition, Drinks Reception & Close

Training the next generation How will Insigneo help to train the next generation of in silico scientists? Discover more about our Doctoral Training Programme and the opportunities to study with us.

From engineering to computing science and medicine, learn about the wide range of areas where in silico methods can be applied.

Firth Hall, Firth Court. Exhibition area open Marco Viceconti, Mike Hounslow, David Throssell, Tony Weetman Richard Clayton, Fabio Ciravegna, Jim Wild

The Big Data Panel Debate: Public Good v Pricacy Buffet Lunch. Exhibition area open Steve Levine, Dassault Systemes SIMULIA David Reynolds, Commented Posters - Part 1

Commented Posters - Part 2 Rod Hose Marco Viceconti Presentation of prize for best abstract

INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

17

INTERVIEW

An Interview with...

Adriano Henney We posed the VPH Institute’s new Director with a few pertinent questions

Congratulations on being appointed the new maintaining this momentum and using it to raise Director of the VPH Institute! Tell us a bit about the profile of the Institute. We have to work hard your background. to promote our identity and provide a compelling My first degree was in microbiology, following reason for industry to become more engaged which I did a PhD in Medicine, researching and contribute financially to create a sustainable aspects of cardiovascular pathology. This was foundation for the activities we intend to pursue. the foundation for my interest in pathophysiology How do you imagine the and my first experience of VPH initiative 10 years from working across disciplines. My now? postdoctoral studies moved The VPHi has the potential to me technically from cell revolutionise medical practice, biology, through molecular both directly and through biology and ultimately to improvements in the delivery leading my own molecular of effective biomedical genetics group in Oxford. products. The acceptance of Fact File From there, I was recruited these approaches remains Name: Adriano Henney into the pharmaceutical limited and it will take time Position: Programme Director industry where I spent 13 for this to change. We are of the Virtual Liver Network, years, before leaving in 2009 on the way to achieving that Owner of Obsidian Biomedical to set up independently as a change, and my hope is that Consulting Ltd consultant on projects bridging within 10 years, examples Expertise: Cardiovascular academia and industry. offering hard evidence of the genetics, Vascular biology, value of these approaches will Systems biology and What is your vision for the be sufficiently compelling to Systems medicine VPH Institute? establish VPH technologies in My personal vision is routine practice. that the VPHi should become recognised as the authoritative, representative voice of the Do you have a message for our members? modelling and simulation community engaged in My message is simply... Be gentle with me and healthcare research and development. The VPHi don’t expect too much too fast! I have a lot has been very active at the European level in to learn, but I know that I can call the on VPH advocating a greater focus on the application community to educate me, fill in the huge gaps in of in silico medicine approaches in research my experience and support me in building on the and health policy. My short term plans focus on successes achieved under Marco’s leadership.

18 INSIGNEO NEWS

ISSUE 1

SPRING 2015

Image: © 2014, Jürgen Lösel

THE LIVING HEART PROJECT

A TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH INITIATIVE TO REVOLUTIONIZE CARDIOVASCULAR SCIENCE THROUGH REALISTIC SIMULATION

IF WE APPLY THE POWER OF REALISTIC SIMULATION TO HUMAN MODELING, WE CAN REVOLUTIONIZE PATIENT CARE. What if doctors leveraged and relied on the same incredible 3D modeling and realistic simulation technology that the automotive, aerospace, energy, and hi-tech industries have used for decades to virtually design, test, and validate products and processes before they have been built or implemented?

Dassault Systèmes, the 3DEXPERIENCE® company that provides business and people with virtual universes to imagine sustainable innovations, has established the Living Heart Project with the aim of making this dream possible for cardiovascular care.

The Living Heart Project was formed to advance the development of safe and effective cardiovascular products and treatments by uniting engineering, scientific, and biomedical expertise to translate cutting edge science into improved patient care. Through simulation and the creation of validated models, the project aims to accelerate the use of science to provide personalized, interventional patient care.

Realistically simulating the behavior of a heart is extremely complex and requires a connection of knowledge from multiple domains, including electrical, mechanical, and fluids.

Over the past three decades, Dassault Systèmes has developed the most advanced modeling and simulation technology available, all of which is now accessible in a single environment that also enables real-time collaboration between medical and engineering professionals and robust data management, and security.

To learn more about the Living Heart Project and how you may be able to contribute, visit: www.3ds.com/heart.

FIGURES CORRECT AT TIME OF WRITING

139 MEMBERS

40

CLINICIANS

51

AFFILIATED PROJECTS

29

DEPARTMENTS

£23 M I L L I O N

RESEARCH INCOME

4

RESEARCH AREAS

The Pam Liversidge Building Sir Frederick Mappin Building Mappin Street Sheffield S1 3JD +44 (0) 114 222 0162 /5 /7 info@insigneo.org www.insigneo.org