How microCT Can Provide Insight into Dynamic Disease Processes

Pre-clinical research is an important step before introducing a new therapy to humans. Imaging is one of the most crucial ways of seeing how a therapeutic treatment is interacting with the cells in the body. However, many imaging techniques have downfalls and a suitable way to overcome this is by combining techniques – such as MRI and CT.

In this webinar, Prof. Greetje Vande Velde will give an overview of her work, which involves lung and brain infections. Dr Vande Velde will describe how high-field MRI and low dose µCT complement each other; where micro-CT gives high contrast in the lungs and MRI allows clear visualization of the brain.

The webinar will also introduce the use of the Skyscan 1278 micro-CT from Bruker, that was used in Dr Vande Velde’s experiments, as is a non-invasive imaging technique that can be used with the same animal multiple times - to not only create high quality images, but to also minimize the number of animals used in the trials.

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This webinar took place on June 7th, 2018

What to Expect

This webinar will look at how non-invasive imaging can yield much better results at the pre-clinical stage and how the ethics of (pre-) clinical research can also be improved. Expect to see how the Skyscan 1278 MicroCT in combination with a BioSpec 9.4 T MRI can be used to improve the data generated from animals, regardless of the species or disease type. Viewers should also expect to see the many benefits this technique offers, as well as the types of disease that it is useful for.

Key Topics

Introduction to Micro CT

Benefits:

Data Processing (better and more relevant data)
Higher Image Quality
Ability to Image an animal multiple times
High spatial & temporal resolution
Low radiation dosage
Improved pre-clinical workflow

Combining CT with MRI

Applications:

Lung disease
Cardiac disease
Metabolic diseases
Cancerous tumors
Brain imaging
Animal disease model phenotyping

Improving Ethics:

Reducing the number of (transgenic) animals used in pre-clinical research/studies
Non-invasive

Who Should Attend

The webinar is primarily aimed at those who work with animals, in particular transgenic animals, and are looking to refine and reduce, or improve their workflow. Additionally, people who are involved in lung, cardiac and neuroscience research would find this webinar useful.

Speaker

Dr Greetje Vande Velde

Assistant Professor, KU Leuven

Greetje Vande Velde studied Medicine, Bio-engineering and developed her expertise in multimodal non-invasive imaging (MRI, optical imaging, micro-CT) during fellowships at KU Leuven (Belgium), CRG (Barcelona) and Institut Pasteur (Paris). She is Professor at the Imaging and Pathology Department and MoSAIC imaging core facility (KU Leuven). Her research focuses on (infectious) lung diseases and therapy.