Anant Madabhushi, Ph.D.

Anant Madabhushi, the F. Alex Nason professor II of biomedical engineering and director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics, was awarded U.S. patent 9,851,421 titled “Differential Atlas for Cancer Characterization.”

The described invention provides methods and apparatus associated with producing a quantification of differences associated with biochemical recurrence (BcR) in a region of tissue demonstrating prostate cancer.

One example apparatus includes a set of logics, and a data store that stores a set of magnetic resonance (MR) images acquired from a population of subjects. The set of logics includes… Continue reading.

Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Clinic are developing a computerized tissue imaging capability that uses predictive analytics to potentially help identify which lung cancer patients are likely to experience an earlier recurrence of the disease.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) recently awarded Anant Madabhushi, founding director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics at the Case School of Engineering, and his colleagues a $3.2 million grant to more accurately determine which early-stage lung cancer patients would most benefit from chemotherapy following surgery, and which would not.

“Oncologists don’t really have any tools at their disposal to address this particular question,” says Madabhushi, who is principal investigator along with co-principal investigator Vamsidhar Velcheti, MD, a thoracic oncologist at Cleveland Clinic. “Right now, virtually all early-stage lung cancer patients get surgery. The problem is oncologists don’t currently have sufficient information to know which of these patients will also receive added benefit from chemotherapy… Continue reading.

A new machine-learning program developed by researchers at Case Western Reserve University appears to outperform other methods for diagnosing Alzheimer’s disease before symptoms begin to interfere with everyday living, initial testing shows.

More than 5 million Americans may have Alzheimer’s disease, according to estimates, and the numbers are growing as the population ages. The disease is an irreversible, progressive brain disorder that slowly destroys memory and thinking skills. And while there is no cure, several drugs can delay or prevent symptoms from worsening for up to five years or more, according to the National Institute on Aging and published research.

Meanwhile, early diagnosis and treatment—the goal of the new computer-based program—is key to allowing those with the disease to remain independent longer.

The computer program integrates a range of Alzheimer’s disease indicators, including mild cognitive impairment. In two successive stages, the algorithm selects the most pertinent to predict who has Alzheimer’s… Continue reading.

Changes in benign tissues next to prostate tumors may provide an early warning for patients at higher risk for biochemical recurrence after a radical prostatectomy, a study by researchers at Case Western Reserve University and Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions shows.

Biochemical recurrence, which is increasing prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels, can be used to predict which prostate cancer patients will develop local recurrence, distant metastases and death.

In a small sampling, image analysis of the adjacent tissue was a better predictor than the current standard for prognosis following the prostatectomy.

If preliminary findings are confirmed by further studies, they may help doctors decide sooner which patients need more follow-up therapies after surgery or should return for more regular monitoring.

“In a sense, this study is validating what a lot of people think regarding these cancers—that there is a field effect, as if the tumor has hard-to-see tentacles that can affect the patient and outcomes,” said Anant Madabhushi, the F. Alex Nason professor II of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve and leader of the research.

CLEVELAND—Changes in benign tissues next to prostate tumors may provide an early warning for patients at higher risk for biochemical recurrence after a radical prostatectomy, a study by researchers at Case Western Reserve University and Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions shows.

Biochemical recurrence, which is increasing prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels, can be used to predict which prostate cancer patients will develop local recurrence, distant metastases and death.

In a small sampling, image analysis of the adjacent tissue was a better predictor than the current standard for prognosis following the prostatectomy.
If preliminary findings are confirmed by further studies, they may help doctors decide sooner which patients need more follow-up therapies after surgery or should return for more regular monitoring.

“In a sense, this study is validating what a lot of people think regarding these cancers—that there is a field effect, as if the tumor has hard-to-see tentacles that can affect the patient and outcomes,” said Anant Madabhushi, the F. Alex Nason professor II of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve and leader of the research.

Madabhushi worked with Case Western Reserve’s George Lee, a research assistant professor, and Sahirzeeshan Ali, a PhD student, and Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions’ Robert W. Veltri, associate professor of urology, and Jonathan I. Epstein, the Reinhard Professor of Urologic Pathology. Their study is published in the journal European Urology Focus.

CLEVELAND—Prostate cancers are either low-grade, low-risk forms that may be monitored but otherwise untreated. Or they’re serious enough to require surgery and radiation.
Monitoring can cause patients anxiety. Radical treatment comes with complications.
For those patients with a low-risk form who still want to take action, MRI-guided laser ablation is a growing treatment that occupies the middle ground by killing tumor cells directly while limiting the effects to the immediate location.
But what happens to the prostate after ablation?
Researchers at Case Western Reserve University have developed computational tools to use magnetic resonance images to quantitatively evaluate the effects on the form and structure of the prostate following treatment.
“The risks of surgery and radiation are well known,” said Anant Madabhushi, professor of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve and director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics. “This image analysis technology may help us understand the risks of ablation.”

CLEVELAND—For women with the most common type of breast cancer, a new way to analyze magnetic resonance images (MRI) data appears to reliably distinguish between patients who would need only hormonal treatment and those who also need chemotherapy, researchers from Case Western Reserve University report.
The analysis may provide women diagnosed with estrogen positive-receptor (ER-positive) breast cancer answers far faster than current tests and, due to its expected low cost, open the door to this kind of testing worldwide.
The research is published in the journal Nature Scientific Reports.
“In the United States, nearly 70 percent of all breast cancer patients are diagnosed with ER-positive, but the majority don’t need chemotherapy,” said Anant Madabhushi, biomedical engineering professor at Case Western Reserve and research leader.
“Until about 15 years ago, doctors had no way of telling aggressive cancer from non-aggressive, so the majority of women got chemotherapy, which can produce very harsh side effects,” he said.
Since then, a genomic test for differentiating between aggressive and nonaggressive cancer was developed. The test requires doctors to send a biopsy sample to a company that analyzes it and assigns a risk score that the doctors then use to guide treatment.
“The test is used frequently in the United States, but it destroys tissue, requires shipping and costs about $4,000,” said Madabhushi, who is a member of the Case Comprehensive Cancer Center. “The cost puts the test out of reach for people in middle- and low-income countries.”

Case Western Reserve University researchers have been awarded two grants totaling $3.16 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to create analytic software for managing, annotating, sharing and analyzing digital pathology imaging data.

Anant Madabhushi, a professor of biomedical engineering, will lead a seven-institute consortium to expand the capabilities of a freely available pathology image viewer, building what they call a “pathology image informatics platform” (PIIP).

To begin, the PIIP will focus on tools for quantifying tissue-based biomarkers and disease patterns on digital images of prostate and breast cancer biopsy.

“A large number of people realize the potential clues within images,” Madabhushi said. “We need to develop the right tools to unlock the data. … This could help drive the precision medicine revolution.”

Anant Madabhushi, professor of biomedical engineering and director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics (CCIPD), and his team were issued two patents—U.S. patent 9,177,105 and U.S. patent 9,177,014—in pattern recognition of cancer from digital pathology and imaging data.

US Patent 9,177,105, titled “Quantitatively Characterizing Disease Morphology with Co-Occurring Gland Tensors in Localized Subgraphs,” describes a novel methodology for quantitatively describing disease morphology via gland directional entropy in medical images. The algorithm involves the use of second-order statistics to describe local disorder in gland orientations via co-occurring gland tensors. This technology is being used for predicting disease outcomes in prostate cancer histopathology and on high-resolution MRI.

As a high school student in Bombay (now Mumbai), India, in the 1990s, Anant Madabhushi competed against thousands of students for a spot in the country’s premier medical and engineering schools.

Then, his uncle, an engineer with General Electric in the United States, sent him a book on biomedical engineering—at the time, an emerging discipline.

Madabhushi realized biomedical engineering would allow him to converge his strengths in math, engineering and medicine, and he jumped at the opportunity.

Madabhushi’s decision paid off: Now a professor of biomedical engineering, he has earned a multitude of grants to support his research, which focuses on medical imaging data with the hopes of improving cancer diagnostics and treatments. He also serves as director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics at Case Western Reserve University and is a co-founder of Ibris Inc., a startup company that develops image-based assessments for breast cancer prognosis.

Anant Madabhushi, professor of biomedical engineering and director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics at Case Western Reserve University, was elected unanimously to the National Cancer Institute’s Quantitative Imaging Network on account of his ongoing NCI-funded grant R01CA136535-01 titled, “Software to facilitate multimode, multi-scale fused data for Pathology and Radiology.”

The network is designed to promote research and development of quantitative imaging methods for the measurement of tumor response to therapies in clinical trial settings, with the overall goal of facilitating clinical decision-making. Projects include the appropriate development and adaptation and implementation of quantitative imaging methods, imaging protocols, and software solutions and tools and application of these methods in current and planned clinical therapy trials. The projects are focusing on imaging-derived quantitative measurements of responses to drugs and/or radiation therapy, and/or image-guided interventions.

WASHINGTON, D.C.— The American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) has announced the pending induction of Anant Madabhushi, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Computational Imaging and Personalized Diagnostics (CCIPD); Professor in the Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Pathology, Radiology, Urology, General Medical Sciences, and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Case Western Reserve University, to its College of Fellows. Dr. Madabhushi was nominated, reviewed, and elected by peers and members of the College of Fellows For outstanding research and translational contributions in the field of medical image analysis and computer aided diagnosis.