Welcome to the Quantitative BioImaging Laboratory (QBIL) at Emory University School of Medicine. We envision that QBIL will be a leading force in a new era of personalized medicine where quantitative methods of engineering and systems sciences have a pivotal role in disease detection, diagnostics, and treatment. The mission of the QBIL is to shape and advance the science and technology of biomedical imaging through innovative research and inspiring education, with the goal of becoming a destination laboratory internationally recognized as a first choice of both researchers and students. At QBIL, our faculty members, researchers and students play leading roles from basic science discovery to the creation, clinical evolution, and commercialization of new technologies, devices and therapies. QBIL is committed to excellence in scholarship and to the training of the next generation of imaging scientists. QBIL serves the community through advanced innovation, translational research and clinical application of imaging sciences.  

Advances in molecular medicine offer the potential to move beyond traditional cytotoxic anticancer treatments and to develop safer and more effective targeted therapies based on the molecular characteristics of a patient’s tumor.  Significant translational research efforts are needed to realize these emerging opportunities. There are urgent needs to develop Quantitative Imaging methods and clinical decision software tools.  Such quantitative imaging may require the use of multiple imaging modalities. The development of anatomical, functional, and molecular imaging methods requires proper recognition and addressing the complexities associated with the expression of suspected biomarkers. A full understanding of the response patterns for the potential surrogate biomarkers, e.g. those used to monitor angiogenesis, hypoxia, and necrosis, may often require the use of modeling and/or multiparametric analysis of the image data in order to examine quantitative correlations with other clinical metadata and clinical outcomes. These requirements generally hold for the measurements of responses to drugs or radiation therapy and for image-guided interventions.  

Our research concentrates on the development and application of Quantitative Imaging technologies. Specifically, we are interested in synthesizing the information obtained from multiple imaging modalities and sources in order to study disease mechanisms and/or to aid in making clinical decisions. Our research goals are to (1) provide efficient methods and procedures for mapping the properties of tissue in space and time, (2) integrate multiple information streams acquired from different imaging technologies into a single coherent picture, and (3) validate and interpret in vivo imaging data for biologic, physiologic, and pathologic interpretation. The research will combine multimodality imaging and multidimensional data to exploit our current knowledge of the genetic and molecular bases of various diseases and therefore to have substantial positive implications for disease prevention, detection, diagnosis, and therapy.

Baowei Fei, Ph.D., Eng.D.
Director, Quantitative BioImaging Laboratory
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Scholar