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News

This page highlights the latest developments at the Duke Medical Physics Graduate Program. Stories are listed in reverse chronological order. For more information, please see the contact link above.

9/23/2008 - Open House announced for 10/17/2008

The Duke University Medical Physics Graduate Program is pleased to announce its open house for prospective graduate students on Friday Oct 17, 2008, from 11AM-6PM. You are invited to attend to learn more about the program, specifically you may: The open house will take place in the medical physics program space, 2424 Erwin Rd, Hock Plaza, Suite 101, Durham NC 27705. Contact for RSVP: Dr. Olga Baranova, olga.baranova@duke.edu.

Aug 2008 - CAMPEP Accreditation!

The medical physics graduate program at Duke is proud to announce that it has officially received its accreditation by the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Educational Programs (CAMPEP), for both MS and PhD study. Our accreditation is effective Jan 1, 2008 through Dec 31, 2012. This accreditation means that our students will now qualify for the changes in board eligibility that are coming in 2012.

8/25/2008 - Fall 2008 schedule

This fall we offer 10 classes: 
MEDPHY 200	RADIATION PHYSICS
MEDPHY 205	ANAT/PHYSIOL MED PHYS
MEDPHY 230	MOD DIAG IMAGING SYSTEMS
MEDPHY 251	SEMINARS IN MEDICAL PHYSICS
MEDPHY 312	RADIOBIOLOGY I
MEDPHY 313	RADIOBIOLOGY II
MEDPHY 322	ADV PHOTON BEAM RAD THERAPY
MEDPHY 328	CLINICAL PRACTICUM (RT)
MEDPHY 331	ADV MED IMAGING PHYSICS
MEDPHY 348	CLINICAL PRACTICUM & SHADOWING (NM)

1/1/2008 - Holiday party


The medical physics faculty and students gather at Dr. Samei's house on Dec 8 for our annual holiday party. Here are just some snapshots. Left: program director Dr. Dobbins chatting with several faculty and students. Center and right: students awaiting the outcome of the "white elephant" gift drawing.

1/8/2008 - Spring 2008 classes

For this spring, we continue to offer a rich variety of classes, they are listed below by course number, title, and instructor:
MEDPHY 210 Radiation Protection (Yoshizumi)
MEDPHY 220 Radiation Therapy Physics (Oldham)
MEDPHY 241 Nuclear Medicine Physics (Turkington)
MEDPHY 251 Seminars in Medical Physics (Lo/Oldham)
MEDPHY 323 Advanced Brachytherapy and Special Procedures (Yin)
MEDPHY 328 Clinical Practicum in Radiation Therapy (Z. Wang/Wu)
MEDPHY 332 Molecular Imaging Seminar (Mukundan)
MEDPHY 338 Clinical Practicum in Diagnostic Imaging (Trahey)

1/8/2008 - Seminars in Medical Physics

The full seminar schedule is now finalized at http://www.medicalphysics.duke.edu/seminar/. Here are just some highlights. We kick off with Dr. Tourassi's biostats talk, part 2 of 2 which we will likely repeat every 2 years to make sure every MS class gets it. Trust me, you'll thank her later in life.

Every semester we will bring you at least 1 talk by an MD, this semester we have 2: Dr. Jaffe on imaging for abdominal pain in pregnancy, and Dr. Chin from nukes in a few weeks.

We are starting a few new themed series. Every semester we will present a "hot topic" discussion covering controversial and important issues in med phys. As introduced in Dr. Jaffe's talk, CT dose is the big issue today when it comes to pediatric imaging. Drs. Frush and Yoshizumi will present both sides of this issue.

We also begin a series we're calling RT Clinical Practice Lectures, where we will invite our RT clinical faculty to share their practical expertise. Kicking this series off will be Dr. Sua Yoo who will talk about her recent advanced training course in Varian gating systems. This is cutting edge practical clinical insights that very few people in the country are privy to.

We will have 2 student-driven sessions. The first will be 2/14 just before the SPIE Medical Imaging conference, when 3 MEDPHY & BME students will share with you their research while practicing their talks. The second will be 3/6 during the Open House, when MEDPHY students will present posters for each other as well as our visitors.

We are pleased to be able to host 2 outside speakers this semester, Drs. Charles Mistretta and David Townsend, who will be coming near the end of the semester.

Finally, we round out the schedule with research-oriented talks by our own faculty, including Dr. Martin Tornai on multimodality breast imaging, Dr. Joseph Lo on breast tomosynthesis imaging, and Dr. Ehsan Samei on dose and quality optimization of imaging systems.

12/1/2007 - Samei honored by AAPM

Ehsan Samei PhD, director of graduate studies, was honored for "Distinguished Service to Medical Physics" by the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM). He was also elected to the Science Council of the AAPM. The Science Council examines specific areas of medical physics to determine advancement mechanisms, addresses scientific questions, and collates and assesses data.

11/28/2007 - Yoshizumi elected to board

Terry Yoshizumi PhD, head of the medical health physics study track and Duke's radiation safety officer, was elected to the Board of Directors of the Health Physics Society, which is a scientific and professional organization specializing in occupational and environmental radiation safety.

10/1/2007 - Josh Wilson elected to committee

Joshua Wilson, PhD graduate student, was elected as the graduate and professional student representative to the Medical Center Affairs Committee of the Duke University Board of Trustees.

9/28/2007 - Sam Brady won student paper competition

Back in July, MS graduate Sam Brady won the student paper competition at the national Health Physics Society annual meeting in Portland Oregon. His talk was on the calibration of MOSFET dosimetry used to estimate doses to expermental mice that undergo x-ray irradiation in research. He also won a $700 travel award. Sam has stayed on in our program to pursue a PhD.

9/28/2007 - Open House announced for 10/19/2007

The Duke University Medical Physics Graduate Program is pleased to announce its open house for prospective graduate students on Friday Oct 19, 2007, from 11AM-6PM. You are invited to attend to learn more about the program, specifically you may: The open house will take place in the medical physics program space, 2424 Erwin Rd, Hock Plaza, Suite 101, Durham NC 27705. Contact for RSVP: Dr. Olga Baranova, olga.baranova@duke.edu.

9/11/2007 - Congrats to fellowship recipients

We are pleased to announce the following fellowship recipients among our PhD students. Kristy Perez and Sangroh Kim were the first ever recipients of the Carestream Health Fellowship, Xiang Li was the first ever recipient of the Carey E. Floyd Jr. Graduate Fellowship. Justin Roper and Jennifer Seger are the first ever recipients of the Cross-disciplinary Training in Medical Physics training grant funded by NIH/NIBIB. These are all administered by our own program. D'Vone Jackson received the Duke Endowment Fellowship as well as the James B. Duke Fellowship, both from the graduate school awards system. Jin Wooi Tan joined our program with a fellowship from the Malaysian government. Congratulations to all!

9/9/2007 - Update on recent MS graduates

We graduated our first MS class this past spring. So far 4 students are continuing their education in PhD programs (3 at Duke), while 9 students are already working as physicists in clinics, hospitals, or consulting companies. A list of MS thesis titles is included on the students page.

9/8/2007 - Welcoming picnic

We welcome our biggest class yet of 7 new PhD and 15 new MS students with a picnic at the Duke Faculty Club. The program now has 16 PhD and 28 MS students for a total of 44 students. Our program coordinator Olga Baranova arranged for a delicious NC BBQ meal (overheard from a student new to the American South: "Everything is brown or orange!"). Here are some pics, larger images also available. (Photo credit: Xiang Li & Joseph Lo)

8/27/2007 - Fall 2007 schedule

Here are upcoming important dates for the program: Sep 8 welcoming picnic, Oct 12 open house, Nov 2 career day, Dec 8 holiday party. This fall we offer 10 classes listed on the Registrar's website. They are: 
MEDPHY 200	RADIATION PHYSICS
MEDPHY 205	ANAT/PHYSIOL MED PHYS
MEDPHY 228	CLINICAL PRACTICUM (RT)
MEDPHY 230	MOD DIAG IMAGING SYSTEMS
MEDPHY 248	CLINICAL PRAC & SHAWDOWING(NM)
MEDPHY 251	SEMINARS IN MEDICAL PHYSICS
MEDPHY 322	ADV PHOTON BEAM RAD THERAPY
MEDPHY 331	ADV MED IMAGING PHYSICS
MEDPHY 359	IND STUDY IN MEDICAL PHYSICS
MEDPHY 360	PUB SPEAKING FOR MED PHYSICS

July 2007 - NIH training grant awarded

The medical physics graduate program at Duke is happy to announce that it has received a large training grant from NIH. This grant, in the amount of $750,000, will provide funding for five years to enhance the education of our PhD students. The theme of this grant is "Cross-disciplinary training in medical physics," and will emphasize training the next generation of research scientists to be experts in more than one subdiscipline of medical physics. The graduate program at Duke is one of the few medical physics programs in North America to receive a training grant from NIH.

5/1/2007 - First MS class graduates

The program graduated its first class of MS students this year. From the class of 16 students admitted in 2005, over 2/3 have already been employed by established clinical facilities around the country or admitted to our doctoral program to continue their medical physics studies at Duke. To our first ever class, congratulations and good luck!

12/1/2006 - Spring 2007 classes

This is the list of courses to be offered this coming spring 2007. It includes several new courses being offered for the first time, with Advanced Brachytherapy by Dr. Yin, Nuclear Medicine Physics by Dr. Turkington, and Biostatistics for Medical Physicists by Dr. Tourassi: 
MEDPHY 210	RADIATION PROTECTION
MEDPHY 220	RADIATION THERAPY PHYSICS
MEDPHY 228	CLINICAL PRACTICUM (RT)
MEDPHY 251	SEMINARS IN MEDICAL PHYSICS
MEDPHY 323	ADV BRACHYTHERAPY/SP PROC
MEDPHY 341	NUCLEAR MEDICINE PHYSICS
MEDPHY 359	IND STUDY IN MEDICAL PHYSICS
MEDPHY 361	BIOSTATISTICS FOR MED PHYSICS

11/3/2006 - Ronald Jaszczak receives lifetime achievement award

Congratulations to Ronald Jaszczak, professor of radiology and BME, and faculty of the Medical Physics Graduate Program, who received the 2006 Edward J. Hoffman Medical Imaging Scientist Award from IEEE Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society for his "important and sustained lifetime contributions to nuclear and medical imaging sciences, particularly single-photon emission computed tomography." The Award was presented to Dr. Jaszczak on November 3rd in San Diego at the 2006 IEEE Nuclear Sciences Symposium and Medical Imaging Conference. Dr. Jaszczak also received the 2000 Paul C. Aebersold Award from the Society of Nuclear Medicine for his outstanding contributions in basic science applied to Nuclear Medicine, and, in 2004, he received the Outstanding Alumni Award from the Physics Department of the School of Liberal Arts Sciences at the University of Florida.

10/5/2006 - Adam Wax receives teaching award

Adam Wax, assistant professor of biomedical engineering and faculty of our program, received the Capers and Marion McDonald Award for Excellence in Teaching and Research. He and other faculty award recipients were recognized at last week's Founder's Day Convocation for the university. Dr. Wax's research interests [ext. link] include optical spectroscopy for early cancer detection, novel microscopy and interferometry techniques.

10/4/2006 - Open House 2006 scheduled for Oct 27

Duke University Medical Physics Graduate Program is pleased to announce its open house for prospective graduate students. You can visit departments and labs, talk with faculty and students, learn about financial aid and scholarships, tour the campus, attend a lecture of the Seminars in Medical Physics course, and have dinner and socialize with Medical Physics students. RSVP to Olga Baranova, olga.baranova@duke.edu. We look forward to seeing you at Open House 2006!

9/9/2006 - Welcome Picnic at Duke Faculty Club

We officially welcomed our second class matriculating in 2006 with a picnic for students, faculty, staff and families. The event at the Duke Faculty Club [ext. link] featured authentic North Carolina barbecue, basketball, and other outdoor activities.

(photo credit: Danny Kalathil)

9/1/2006 - Fall 2006 course schedule

This fall we have our largest selection of courses to date. We introduced 5 new classes: MEDPHY 322 Advanced Radiation Therapy Physics, MEDPHY 331 Advanced Medical Imaging Physics, MEDPHY 360 Public Speaking for Medical Physicists, MEDPHY 228 Clinical Practicum and Shadowing (Radiation Therapy), and MEDPHY 248 Clinical Practicum and Shadowing (Nuclear Medicine). In addition we continue to offer courses from last fall: MEDPHY 205 Anatomy/Physiology for Medical Physics, MEDPHY 200 Radiation Physics, MEDPHY 230/BME 233 Modern Diagnostic Imaging Systems.
We also continue our recurring MEDPHY 251 Seminar in Medical Physics. The seminar schedule this semester includes introductions to the 4 major study tracks that comprise our program, lectures from program faculty: Dr. Mukunduan on nanoparticle contrast agents, Dr. Badea on x-ray imaging of small animals, and Dr. Dobbins on image quality. We are also very pleased to host 3 distinguished outside speakers: Dr. Guy Besson of Forevision Technologies, Dr. Roderic Pettigrew who is director of NIH/NIBIB, and Dr. Geoffrey Ibbott of MD Anderson. Finally there will be a recap of ASTRO conference talks and a round table discussion on professionalism.

9/1/2006 - In Memoriam

Program faculty Dr. Tom Raidy (left) and Dr. Carey Floyd (right) passed away in June and August respectively. Dr. Raidy was Clinical Associate Professor of Radiation Oncology. His research interests focused on the clinical use of Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Spectroscopy in radiation treatment planning and in measuring treatment response. Prior to joining Duke he was active in industry research including GE. Dr. Carey Floyd was Professor of Radiology and Biomedical Engineering, and director of our program's Diagnostic Imaging track. His many research interests included nuclear medicine reconstruction algorithms, scatter measurements in chest radiography, computer-aided diagnosis of breast and lung cancer , and neutron stimulated emission computed tomography. He was awarded a lifetime career achievement award from Duke's Department of Radiology on July 14, 2006 at a party in Duke's Nasher Art Museum [ext. link]. In recognition of Carey's superb mentorship of 20+ students (including current program faculty Drs. Lo and Tourassi), a graduate fellowship was established in his name and will be administered by the Medical Physics Graduate Program. The above website contains pictures from the party as well as a full-length obituary. We will miss these colleagues. (photo credit: unknown/Ehsan Samei)

5/1/2006 - Faculty page update

We added the track affiliations for each of our faculty, which you can see by scrolling to the right of the table. The letters RT, DI, NM, and MHP stand for the 4 tracks that comprise our program: radiation therapy, diagnostic imaging, nuclear medicine, and medical health physics.

4/16/2006 - Admissions update

After an extremely competitive selection process involving over 140 applicants, we eventually admitted 4 students for the Ph.D. and 14 for the M.S. program. Congratulations to those students, and we look forward to welcoming you to Duke this fall!

3/9/2006 - William Hendee visit

On Mar 9-10 we held our annual graduate student visitation and interview event to provide information about the Medical Physics Graduate Program to prospective and admitted students. As part of this event, we were honored to welcome Dr. William Hendee as a special visitor. At the weekly Seminars in Medical Physics, he spoke on "Creativity and Innovation in Action: Migration of the Products of Biomedical Research into the Marketplace." He also spent several hours talking to faculty and students, including the break out session pictured here (left to right: Dr. Hendee, Director of Graduate Studies Dr. Samei, and medical physics Ph.D. student Josh Wilson). In addition to being the current editor of Medical Physics, the premiere journal in our field, Dr. Hendee also holds the following positions at the Medical College of Wisconsin: Senior Associate Dean and Vice President, Dean of the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Professor and Vice-Chair of Radiology, and Professor of Radiation Oncology, Biophysics, Bioethics. (photo credit: Xiang Li)

2/1/2006 - Student profiles posted

We just added a students page to our site featuring some of our current students talking about why they chose to study medical physics at Duke. Thanks to student representative Josh Wilson for compiling photographs and conducting interviews, and to the students for participating.

1/12/2006 - Spring 2006 course schedule

This semester, we offer MEDPHY 210 Radiation Protection and MEDPHY 220 Therapeutic Medical Physics. In addition we continue with MEDPHY 251 Seminar in Medical Physics, see the seminar schedule. This seminar series has been running every semester since fall of 2000, and is now in its 2nd semester as an official medical physics course. Organized by Drs. Lo and Samei, the seminars feature speakers covering a wide range of topics in medical physics. Thanks to the publicity and free ipods (see 12/14/2005 story below) associated with us being selected as part of the Duke Digital Initiative, the class sets a new record of 51 students! This semester we are proud to present the famous scientific writing expert Dr. George Gopen, 2 MD faculty from radiology, Dr. Tourassi in a sequel to her well-received biostatistics lecture, and various other medical physics program speakers. Our outside speaker this semester will be Dr. William Hendee, editor of the Medical Physics journal, whose visit will coincide with our March open house and PhD student interviews.

1/11/2006 - New radiology website debuts

Check out the new website for Duke radiology [ext. link], which is the primary department for most of the faculty from the diagnostic imaging, nuclear medicine, and medical health physics study tracks.

12/14/2005 - Free ipods for all!

Just in time for the holidays, we are pleased to announce for spring 2006, MEDPHY 251 Seminars in Medical Physics was approved as one of Duke's prestigious digital technology courses [ext. link] (search for the 2 occurrences of "physics"). This is part of the Duke Digital Initiative [ext. link]. What this means is that every student will be given a free 20GB 4th generation ipod and microphone. We will use the ipods to record and podcast every seminar talk, transfer large multimedia files, etc. Since the seminar course is required for all program students, that means every student in the program gets the free ipod!

12/9/2005 - Holiday lunch

The students and faculty of the medical physics graduate program gathered in the program's space for a holiday feast catered by a local Greek restaurant.

(photo credit: Jim Dobbins)

11/1/2005 - Dr. Yoshizumi named to national committee

Terry Yoshizumi, head of the medical health physics study track and Duke's radiation safety officer, was invited to become a member of Scientific Committee 6-2, National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP). This committee will prepare a new report on "Ionizing Radiation Exposure of the United States Population." Dr. Ken Kase, Past President of Heath Physics Society will servce as Chairman. The project is funded by US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Dr. Donald Frush, another faculty member of our program, also serves on the NCRP as a member of the Program Area Committee 4, Radiation Protection in Medicine.

10/31/2005 - Halloween Party

Students enjoy a Halloween theme lunch party in the medical physics program's common area.

(photo credit: Xiang Li)

10/05/2005 - Open House for Oct 20 announced

We are happy to announce our annual open house for prospective graduate students. The whole day event will be held on Oct 20 2005 right here in the medical physics program space, Suite 101 of Hock Plaza. Students will be able to visit departments and labs, talk with faculty and students, learn about financial aid and scholarships, tour the campus, attend the weekly seminar on career opportunities in medical physics, etc. Contact Olga Baranova to RSVP.

09/10/2005 - Welcoming Picnic at Falls Lake

Medical physics students, faculty, and staff brought their families and enjoyed a day at the Rolling View State Recreation Area [ext. link] at Falls Lake, a short drive from campus. Lunch was catered by Gillis BBQ. It was a great opportunity to relax and get to know each other better outside of classes and work. Thanks to Olga for organizing this event!


(photo credit: Joseph Lo)

09/06/2005 - Hurricane Katrina response

We are doing our share in the campus-wide efforts [ext. link] to respond to the devastation. If you are a medical physics graduate student who has been displaced by Hurricane Katrina, you may contact our director to discuss the possibility of studying at Duke this semester.

09/02/2005 - Seminars in medical physics begins with orientation/welcome


(photo credit: Joseph Lo) 		We kicked off MEDPHY 251, Seminars in Medical Physics, in the Hock Auditorium. Director of graduate studies Dr. Samei welcomes the faculty and students, and summarizes all of the key features of the program. You may go to the graduate program page to download slides from his talk.