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My research focuses on the role of inflammation and the study of its’ organization, cellular make-up, and presence of cognate versus non-cognate immune interactions. The latter are dissected by means of high-throughput, computerized, and objective techniques based on multichannel immunofluorescent confocal microscopy image analysis. Together with my collaborators, I developed cutting edge approaches to the segmentation and analysis of in vivo cellular interactions using Convolutional Neural Networks and Deep Learning. In addition, I recently pioneered a new technique to digest frozen clinical muscle biopsies to obtain intact immune cells for use in flow cytometry and downstream single cell applications. We are using this approach to study antibody producing cell populations in the muscles of IIM patients.
Besides the standard medical basic science curriculum, I participated in several years of additional independent study, including the AAI Advanced Immunology Course, graduate courses in Immunology and Image Analysis at the University of Chicago, the Optical Microscopy and Imaging in the Biomedical Sciences course offered at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, as well as the NIH Big TaP curriculum at Purdue University. I also possess a Master's Degree in Medical Bioinformatics with focuses on Image Analysis and Big Data Analytics.
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