In the Spotlight - Manoj Saranathan, PhD

Manojkumar Saranathan, PhD joined the department as Professor of Radiology, in the Division of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering in April. He is co-director of the Image Processing and Analysis Core (iPAC) and co-director of the Advanced MRI Center (AMRIC). His research interests include MRI physics, translational imaging and medical image processing.

Dr. Saranathan is an MRI physicist with over twenty-five years of experience in MR physics, pulse sequence development, image reconstruction, and image processing spanning industry (GE) and academia (Stanford, Mayo, UA). His current research interests are focused on ultra high-resolution imaging and segmentation of deep brain structures like thalamus and hippocampus and the specificity of their involvement in pathology such as alcoholism, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, and essential tremor. Another area of interest is high spatio-temporal resolution dynamic contrast enhanced MRI for quantification of physiologic function and cancer. One of his methods, DISCO, is now a product available on all GE MRI scanners since 2017, and is widely used for prostate and breast imaging worldwide.

Dr. Saranathan earned a PhD in Bioengineering from University of Washington, Seattle. He joins UMass Chan Medical School from the Department of Medical Imaging at the University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ. As an Associate Professor at UA he headed the medical physics team providing research and logistical support to multiple clinical MRI scanners, developed novel methods for accelerating dynamic MRI and characterization of subcortical brain structures. He also taught graduate level courses and mentored masters and doctoral students in biomedical and electrical engineering, as well as MR physics to residents, fellows, and technologists. His outside interests include cooking, backpacking, photography, quizzing, crosswords, and birdwatching!

Welcome Manoj!