Biomedical Imaging and Biophotonics

The Duke BME program is a world leader in development of novel biomedical imaging technologies, with translational and basic science applications.

In the past few decades, our faculty have pushed the boundaries of discovery and innovation in optics and photonics (e.g. optical coherence tomography and low-coherence interferometry), ultrasound (e.g. acoustic radiation force impulse based elasticity imaging), MRI, X-ray, and nuclear medicine-based imaging technologies, developing new diagnostic and treatment tools for ailments ranging from cancer to cardiovascular, neurological, and ophthalmic diseases.

Our research efforts span from advancing the physics and mathematical theory of imaging, image acquisition, and image processing to hardware design and clinical applications. We address longstanding problems in development of multi-dimensional and multi-modality imaging systems with unmatched image acquisition speed, resolution, and penetration depth. We investigate development of complex image-guided clinical tools (e.g., autonomous surgical robots) to cheap and robust image diagnostic technologies (e.g., cellphone cameras).

There are extensive collaborations between our biomedical imaging and Duke University Medical Center clinicians, resulting in rapid translation of numerous imaging technologies developed at Duke BME to the patient bedside and commercialization.

The Biomedical Imaging research community at Duke is supported and enhanced by numerous centers and programs, including the Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics, the Duke Center for In Vivo Microscopy, the Center for Global Women’s Health Technologies, and the Duke Medical Imaging Training Program.