Dr. R. James Swanson, Professor & Chair, Department of Anatomical Sciences, Liberty University, USA Speech Title: Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Field (nsPEF) Causes Instantaneous Cellular Membrane Modulation by Altering Calreticulin Expression

Abstract: Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Field (nsPEF) is a novel cancer ablation technology which applies high pulsed power into ultra short pulses and causes non-thermal bioeffects on cell membrane. It is hypothesized to open nanopores in the lipid layers on cell membrane but the direct morphological evidence is still lack. This study designed a unique cell capture system to record the instantaneous membrane changes in the early stage of cell death. The melanoma B16-F10 cells and Jurkat T leukemia cells were treated by nsPEF (300 ns, at 2 kV/cm, 4 kV/cm and 8 kV/cm). The morphological changes on plasma membranes caused by nsPEF were snapped in liquid nitrogen after the cells in nsPEF treatment system equipped with free falling track and pulsor. Immediately after a single pulse, the pulsed cells plunged into liquid nitrogen by gravity for scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Beside liquid nitrogen the cell culture media was also used to collect pulsed cells for MTT, apoptosis, cell cycle and CRT expression. The study provides the first hand direct SEM proof of near-real-time cell membrane changes duiring nsPEF-caused cancer cell death. The non-thermal nsPEF induces higher expression of cell surface calreticulin (CRT), a key protein adjusting the lipid raft suspension and trafficking, which contribute to a dynamical membrane rafting, pore perforation and cell death. Keywords: nanosecond pulsed electric field (nsPEF); membrane perforation; fresh freeze; calreticulin pathway

Dr. Lili Chen, Associate Professor/ Medical Physicist, Department of Radiation Oncology, Fox Chase Cancer Center, PA, USA Speech Title: MR Guided Pulsed High Intensity Focused Ultrasound Enhancement of Docetaxel Combined with Radiotherapy for Prostate Cancer Treatment

Abstract: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of the enhancement of docetaxel by pulsed focused ultrasound (pFUS) in combination with radiotherapy (RT) for treatment of prostate cancer in vivo. LNCaP cells were grown in the prostates of male nude mice. When the tumors reached a designated volume by MRI, tumor bearing mice were randomly divided into 7 groups (n=5): (1) pFUS alone; (2) RT alone; (3) docetaxel alone; (4) docetaxel + pFUS; (5) docetaxel + RT; (6) docetaxel + pFUS + RT; and (7) control. MR guided pFUS treatment was performed using a focused ultrasound treatment system (InSightec ExAblate 2000) with a 1.5T GE MR scanner. Animals were treated once with pFUS, docetaxel, RT or their combinations. Docetaxel was given by i.v. injection at 5 mg/kg before pFUS. RT was given 2 Gy after pFUS. Animals were euthanized 4 weeks after treatment. Tumor volumes were measured on MRI at 1 and 4 weeks post-treatment. Results showed that triple combination therapies of docetaxel, pFUS and RT provided the most significant tumor growth inhibition among all groups, which may have a potential for the treatment of prostate cancer due to an improved therapeutic ratio. Keywords: MRgFUS, docetaxel, RT, prostate cancer, in vivo

Dr. Neda Zarrin-Khameh, Associate Professor, Deputy Chief of Anatomic Pathology, Ben Taub Hospital; Department of Pathology & Immunology, Baylor College of Medicine, USA Speech Title: Strongyloides in Cerebrospinal Fluid

Abstract: A 45-year-old Latino man with diabetes mellitus type II and recent episode of pneumonia presented to the emergency room with complaint of rectal pain for a week. He was found to have a perirectal abscess and admitted for debridement. Screening HIV test was positive with a T lymphocyte count of 2, a diagnosis previously unknown to the patient. Throughout his course of admission, his mental status deteriorates. Strongyloides was found on cytologic evaluation of his CSF. Strongyloides involvement of CSF is rare and most of them are seen on postmortem examination. The main risk factor for developing hyperinfection and disseminated disease is immunosuppression; which frequently seen in patients with advanced HIV infection or patients received corticosteroid treatment. Keywords: CSF, HIV, Strongyloides

Dr. Robert Guidoin, Professor, Department of Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Université Laval, Canada Speech Title: Cardiovascular Devices For Implantology: How The 3bs Concept Contributes To The Culture Of Safety

Abstract: The development of myriads of innovative implantable devices during the last decades proved to be mostly physician and industry driven. The clinicians continue to require more and more sophisticated devices to restore various functionalities and allow more and more patients with complex and sometimes life threatening pathologies to be treated. Thus the life of the patients is prolonged and made more comfortable. More...

Dr. Haiyan Zhou, Professor, Hainan Medical College School of Dental Medicine Director of the Central Laboratory, the First Affiliated Hospital of Hainan Medical College, China Speech Title: Identification of Mineral Crystal Nucleators in Bone

Abstract: Biomineralization involves proteins directly in controlling the mineral crystal nucleation/induction, growth, and maturation. We presented these ~300 proteins at the last conference. Among these proteins, here we will show the proteins for inducing mineral crystal deposition, providing new insights into the mechanisms for bone formation and ectopic mineralization such as vascular calcification and for creating mineralized organic matrices that can substitute for bone. Keywords: mineral crystal nucleator, biomineralization, bone formation, vascular calcification, mineralized organic matrices

	Dr. Alex Thompson, Imperial College Research Fellow, Surgical Innovation Centre, St. Mary's Hospital, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London, UK Speech Title: A three-dimensional microscale gripper with an integrated optical force sensor for controlled micromanipulation
Abstract: Microrobotic devices have wide-ranging potential applications in biology and medicine, including targeted drug delivery, cellular manipulation and microsurgery. With the aim of developing microscale surgical robots, we have fabricated a tethered 3D microgripper with integrated force sensing on the tip of an optical fibre using two-photon polymerisation. More...

Dr. Huiyu Zhou, Reader, Department of Informatics, University of Leicester, UK Speech Title: Mouse behavior analysis for Parkinson's disease

Abstract: Automated recognition of mouse behaviours is crucial in studying psychiatric and neurologic diseases, e.g. Parkinson’s disease. To achieve this objective, it is very important to analyse temporal dynamics of mouse behaviours. In this paper, we develop and implement a novel Hidden Markov Model (HMM) algorithm to describe the temporal characteristics of mouse behaviours. In particular, we here propose a hybrid deep learning architecture, where the first unsupervised layer relies on a new spatial-temporal segment Fisher Vector (SFV) encoding both visual and contextual features. Subsequent supervised layers based on our segment aggregated network (SAN) are trained to estimate the state dependent observation probabilities of the HMM. Finally, we evaluate our approach using JHuang’s and our own datasets, and the results show that our method outperforms other state-of-the-art approaches. Keywords: Mouse behaviour; Fisher Vector; Contextual features; Deep learning

Dr. Jing-Huei Lee, Professor and Graduate Program Director, Biomedical Engineering, University of Cincinnati, USA Speech Title: Dynamic Spatially Selective Dephasing for Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy

Abstract: ttributing to the early invention of the slice selection technique, single-voxel magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) is a widely used tool for biomedical research in vivo since the launch of the MR Imaging (MRI). The results of MRS studies often report the ratios of certain chemical compounds in tissues. More... Keywords: MRSI, dynamic shimming, spatially selective dephasing, 13C MRS, 31P MRS

Dr. Perry Xiao, Associate Professor and Course Director, School of Engineering, London South Bank University, UK Speech Title: Digital Image Processing for In-vivo Skin Capacitive Contact Imaging

Abstract: Capacitive contact imaging, originally developed for biometric applications, has shown potential in measuring skin properties including skin hydration and skin texture. Our previous studies showed it also can be used for solvent penetration measurements, skin damage assessments, as well as hair and nail water content measurements, despite the low water content. More... Keywords: Digital image processing, capacitive contact imaging, skin, skin hydration, skin damages

Dr. Jie Yao, Professor, School of Medicine, Sun Yat-Sen University, China Speech Title: Optical Detection of Transcriptional Activities in Single Cells

Abstract: Single cell optical imaging has become a major approach to study mechanisms of transcriptional regulation in higher eukaryotes. I will discuss our recent work in detecting transcriptional activities in cultured mammalian cells by single molecule RNA fluorescence in situ hybridization. We have successfully identified transcription sites of endogenous genes and counted nascent transcripts. We have generated single-copy promoter transgenes by site-specific DNA recombination and have quantitatively analyzed changes in promoter activities in single cells. We have studied the roles of cell cycle progression and transcription factor NF-Y binding in regulating mouse Ccnb1 gene. This work will facilitate single cell analysis on transcriptional regulation in mammals. Keywords: Optical imaging, transcriptional regulation, mammalian cells, fluorescence in situ hybridization, single cell analysis

Dr. Sebastian Oltean, Institute of Biomedical & Clinical Sciences, University of Exeter Medical School, UK Speech Title: Use of splicing-sensitive fluorescent reporters to screen for modulators of VEGF-A splicing in vitro and to understand splicing regulation in vivo in transgenic mice

Abstract: Through alternative splicing of the terminal exon in the VEGF-A gene, two functionally distinct isoform families are generated. Use of the canonical proximal 5’ splice site results in the expression of the pro-angiogenic VEGF-Axxx isoforms, whereas use of the distal 3’ splice site results in anti-angiogenic VEGF-Axxxb expression. More... Keywords: alternative splicing, splicing reporters, VEGF-A

Dr. William Cho, Scientific Officer, Department of Clinical Oncology, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Hong Kong, China Speech Title: Application of Liquid Biopsy in Cancer Research

Abstract: Liquid biopsy has been gaining much attention in cancer research as a complementary or alternative sample to solid tissue biopsy due to its less invasive procedure and the provision of sampling at multiple time points for cancer progress monitoring. In addition, a better representation of tumor heterogeneity can be found in liquid biopsy and faster turnaround time from sample to results can be achieved. This talk will share some applications of liquid biopsy in cancer research, focusing on the circulating cell-free nucleic acids, circulating tumor cells, extracellular vesicles, circulating PIWI-interacting RNAs and microRNA studies. Liquid biopsy will usher in a new era of cancer management, it is a good source for early detection, disease monitoring (including detecting tumor loading, resistance, mutation and recurrence), and perhaps for screening in the future. Furthermore, the facilitation of biomarker detection by digital PCR and next-generation sequencing will also be briefly covered. Keywords: Circulating cell-free nucleic acids, circulating tumor cells, extracellular vesicles, digital PCR, next-generation sequencing

	Dr. Fengfeng Zhou, Professor, BioKnow Health Informatics Lab, College of Computer Science and Technology, Jilin University, China Speech Title: More is not always better, demonstrated by selecting features for the integrated OMIC analysis
Keywords: biomarker detection; epigenetic biomarker; feature selection

	Dr. Rajesh R., Associate Professor and Head, Department of Computer Science, Central University of Kerala, India Speech Title: Do we need pre-filtering in NLM? – A study on ultrasound images
Abstract: The presence of speckle noise in ultrasound images creates difficulty in effectual medical inference. The effect of pre-filtering in ultrasound images using Non-local means (NLM) algorithm is studied. Before using the NLM algorithm, prefiltering is done using filters like, median, Lee, anisotropic diffusion (AD) and Laplace of Gaussian (LoG). More...

Dr. Wenjie Cai, Associate Professor, School of Medical Instrument and Food Engineering, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, China Speech Title: Automatic Interpretation of ECG Using Deep Learning

Abstract: Electrocardiography (ECG), which can trace the electrical activity of the heart noninvasively, is widely used to assess heart health. Accurate interpretation of ECG requires significant amounts of education and training. In this work we proposed a novel architecture of deep neural networks to interpret ECG automatically. More... Keywords: Convolutional neural network; Recurrent neural network; Electrocardiography interpretation

	Dr. Jun-Hee Na, Dept. of Electric, Electronic and Communication Engineering Edu., Chungnam National University, Korea Speech Title: Application of a Contact Lens Type Artificial Iris With Self-Regulating Capability by Reversible Photoreaction
Abstract: Application of an artificial iris which provides the biocompatibility, the self-regulation capability without any peripheral component, and replaceability of iris’ function without surgery. More...

Dr. Tingting Zhu, Senior Researcher, Department of Engineering Sciences, University of Oxford, UK Speech Title: Personalised Patient Physiology Monitoring using Bayesian Hierarchical Gaussian Processes

Abstract: With the rapid increase in volume of wearable devices, automated algorithms are employed to label physiological time-series data. The management of chronic diseases can be performed by monitoring continuous time-series vital-sign data (such as blood pressure and heart rate) via low-cost wearable devices. Automated algorithms may then be used with the resulting data to provide early warning of deterioration of the health of an individual. Such algorithms are typically trained for a large population without taking into account the time-variability and inter-subject variability of the data being collected. More...

	Dr. Daniel S. Oh., College of Dental Medicine, Columbia University Medical Center; Founder, DSO Bone Research Institute, USA Speech Title: Innovative Bone Regeneration in Critical Segmental Defect via Bone-like Scaffold
Abstract: An effective, long-term treatment of critical-sized bone defects remains challenging for surgeons and patients. Three key processes within the bioengineering construct, active endogenous cells recruitment into scaffold, homogenous distribution, and inhabitance together with a pro-angiogenic microenvironment is crucial for functional bone restoration. More...

Dr. Dong-Hoon Lee, Research Fellow / MRI Physicist, Faculty of Health Sciences and Brain & Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Australia Speech Title: Creatine Chemical Exchange Saturation Transfer Imaging in the Epileptic Seizure Rat Models

Abstract: Creatine (Cr) plays a major role in the storage and transmission of phosphate-bound energy. Therefore, evaluating of creatine level changes are important studies in the clinic to estimate the brain energy metabolism. The purpose of this study to demonstrate the feasibility of quantitative and qualitative mapping of creatine using chemical exchange saturation transfer (CrCEST) technique in the epileptic seizure rats. More...

	Dr. Haoming Zhang, Pharmacology Department, The University of Michigan Medical School, USA Speech Title: Significant Improvement of Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics of Clopidogrel in AntiPlatelet Therapy by Use of Novel Conjugates
Abstract: Clopidogrel is widely used in anti-platelet therapy to treat patients with acute coronary syndrome. However, it has exhibited clinical limitations such as slow onset and inter-patient variability. The clinical limitations of clopidogrel are in large part due to its poor pharmacokinetics (PK) resulting from inefficient bioactivation by CYP2C19. More...

	Dr. Yifeng Lei, Associate Professor, The Institute of Technological Sciences, Wuhan University, China Speech Title: Surface modification with ferritin nanoparticles to modulate the biocompatibility and performance of implanted glucose sensors
Abstract: Implanted continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) system provides real-time glucose information for diabetic patients. However, the CMG sensors show a rapid decline in analytical performance in vivo due to the foreign body responses. Improving the biocompatibility and function are key challenges in clinical use of CGMs. More...

	Dr. Yujia Xu, Associate professor, Department of Chemistry, Hunter College, The City University of New York, USA Speech Title: A Novel Collagen Mimetic Biomaterial
Abstract: Collagen based biomaterials are projected to be a 41 billion dollar industry by 2020, with a CAGR of 16% based on a recent Benzinga business analysis. Collagen-based materials have been used extensively in medicine, pharmaceuticals, personal care cosmetics, food industry and leather industry. More...

	Dr. Youhua Tan, Assistant Professor, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China Speech Title: Shear stress regulates the mechanics and actomyosin-dependent viability and chemoresistance of circulating tumor cells
Abstract: Tumor cells metastasize to distant organs mainly through hematogenous dissemination. The frequency of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in vasculature is correlated with poor prognosis and overall survival1,2. However, less than 0.01% of them can generate metastatic tumors in secondary sites, indicating the inefficiency of metastasis3. More...