What are your research topics?
I investigate the potential of artificial intelligence and machine learning in the analysis and modelling of imaging findings. The techniques used in imaging are developing at a dizzying rate, and the information produced by the latest methods cannot be fully utilised with the methods traditionally employed by radiologists. We are developing new ways of applying this information.
Where and how does the topic of your research have an impact?
AI solutions bring more information to imaging and can enable increasingly accurate or rapid treatment. For example, when a radiologist identifies a blockage requiring rapid treatment in a cerebral artery of a patient, artificial intelligence can simultaneously indicate, in the same scan, the location and size of the brain area exposed to the circulatory disorder.
Or, while a radiologist reviews MRI scans of the abdominal region to assess potential causes for the patient’s symptoms, artificial intelligence can interpret imaging data that are out of the reach of the human eye and indicate the probability of the patient having an inflammatory bowel disease.
What is particularly inspiring in your field right now?
The ability to utilise continually evolving imaging techniques in the best possible way requires the advancement of radiological thinking and insights for new possibilities. These insights are then applied collaboratively by specialists in technology, physics and medicine. At its best, this will lead to entirely new kind of medical imaging.
Marko Kangasniemi is Professor of Radiology at the Faculty of Medicine.