Rudin Named SPIE Fellow for Biomedical Imaging Advances

Rudin is one of just four people in the field of biomedical imaging who were named SPIE fellows this year.

“There are fewer than 20 of us in the society who are involved in biomedical imaging, so I was surprised that I’m in such exclusive company,” Rudin says.

In all, 73 major international figures in optics, photonics and imaging were named SPIE fellows.

A faculty member since 1977, Rudin is a pioneer in developing new technologies in medical diagnostics and interventional imaging. He has been at the forefront of developing high-resolution X-ray imaging detectors, dose reduction methods and endovascular devices such as asymmetric stents.

Rudin’s work has major theoretical and clinical implications for medical physics, biomedical engineering and diagnostic radiology, as well as an immediate impact upon patient diagnosis and care, particularly in cases of heart and brain treatment.

A leader in advanced X-ray planar and tomography imaging in neuroimaging applications, he has been involved in further developing X-ray angiography and computed tomography (CT) for diagnosis and assessment of neurovascular diseases.

Working with colleagues in the Canon Stroke and Vascular Research Center — formerly the Toshiba Stroke and Vascular Research Center — Rudin and his team have been developing imaging methods geared toward replacing invasive neurovascular surgical procedures for treating pathologies, such as aneurysms, with minimally invasive image-guided interventions.

With continuous funding from the National Institutes of Health and other sources since 1977, Rudin has led the development of prototype high-resolution, real-time imaging detectors for diagnosing neurovascular diseases.

He also has spent much of his career developing techniques that will minimize radiation doses patients receive during procedures such as angiography and CT scans, while improving device guidance.

Rudin has developed new imaging techniques to improve diagnosis and treatment of stroke and related disorders. Some of the projects resulted in products being distributed worldwide.

Rudin founded and directs UB’s Medical Physics graduate program, one of only 41 such nationally accredited programs in the U.S.

He has advised more than 110 graduate students at UB and Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

His group has received numerous awards, including first prizes for various projects, including:

• creation of patient-specific 3D phantoms for vascular procedure treatment planning and research
• patient dose savings with region of interest fluoroscopy
• automatic brightness control in digital fluoroscopy
• evaluation of amorphous selenium for fluoroscopy
• new approaches to quality assurance in digital radiography

Rudin also has held joint appointments in the departments of neurosurgery, physiology and biophysics, biomedical engineering, electrical and computer engineering, mechanical and aerospace engineering, and physics.

A consistent contributor to the SPIE Medical Imaging Symposium and the SPIE medical imaging community in general, Rudin’s advocacy and commitment to the field have resulted in UB’s prominence in medical imaging internationally.

The author of more than 500 publications — including more than 200 SPIE articles and presentations — Rudin has been awarded four patents and has received numerous awards from other major scientific societies, such as the Radiological Society of North America and the American Association of Physicists in Medicine.

Rudin received the Stockton Kimball Award — the highest honor for a faculty member in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences — in 2014.

Rudin is also a fellow of the American Association of Physicists in Medicine.

He earned his doctorate in medical physics from City University of New York and his bachelor’s degree in physics and master’s degree in low temperature solid state physics from the University of Chicago.

Rudin received the honor during the annual SPIE Medical Imaging Conference in February in Houston.