Image Guided Navigation in Airways - Monday 18th April, 1pm, room 204

Image guided navigation in the proximal airways is established in clinical practice. However, much work needs to be done before these tools are useful in reliably accessing the outer airways by endoscopic means or combined with novel therapies for lung cancer. 

This seminar will focus on the recent work in this field by the Biomedical Design Research Group at University College Cork. A novel electromagnetic tracking tool with improved accuracy and interference immunity will be presented. The first open-source virtual bronchoscopy platform will also be discussed as well as a developmental approach to outer airway navigation using semi-automated endoscopic catheter steering coupled with image-guidance. While the results are limited to pre-clinical evaluation, this systematic approach may prove a useful roadmap for future research directions in image-guided interventions. The second half of the talk will focus on systematic device design techniques which have been applied at UCC in recent times to develop innovative solutions to real-life clinical needs. A number of hand-held device case studies will be presented with clinical applications in surgery and anaesthesia. Further information on the group's activities is available at (opens in a new window)http://biodesign.ucc.ie.

About the Presenter:

Pádraig Cantillon-Murphy is currently Lecturer in Electrical and Electronic Engineering at University College Cork, Ireland and an Honorary Lecturer at the Institute of Global Health Innovation, Imperial College London. He  graduated with a first-class honours B.E. degree (2003) in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from University College Cork, Ireland before completing his Master of Science (2005) and Ph.D. (2008) degrees at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His doctoral thesis examined the confluence of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and magnetic nanoparticle dynamics. From 2008 to 2010, he was a postdoctoral research fellow with concurrent appointments at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston and at the Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT. This work examined the role of magnetics in minimally invasive surgical procedures. He is principal investigator at the Bio electromagnetics research group at UCC which explores novel device development in surgery and endoscopy. His current research interests include magnets for surgery, electromagnetic navigation and surgical robotics. His teaching interests include electronic circuits, electromagnetics and biomedical design. He is module coordinator for the UCC Biomedical Design module, an awarding-winning teaching program which couples medical and engineering students at UCC. He is a former Marie Curie fellow (2010-2014), a former MIT Whitaker fellow (2007-08), and a senior member of the IEEE.