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Computational Scientist - Proton Therapy Center

Employer
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
Location
Houston, Texas
Salary
Competitive
Closing date
Sep 11, 2019

View more

Discipline
Health Sciences
Organization Type
Healthcare/Hospital

Job Details

The primary purpose of the Computational Scientists position in the Proton Therapy Center at MD Anderson is to establish and build a computational infrastructure in the Texas Particle Therapy Institute (TPTI) to facilitate the clinical operation efficiency improvement and advance the state of art proton/particle therapy technology.

The ideal candidate is expected to possess the unique skills to improve and implement the new dose calculation methods and optimization methods. The candidate is also required to be the expert on the high performance computing, large database design and is able to design algorithm using the deep learning method.

The candidate will work on three aspects of the technology developments of proton/particle therapy:

  • Focus on new technology development and improvement such as Single Isocenter Adaptive Stereotactic Body Proton Therapy (SIAP) and proton arc therapy based on synchrotron.
  • Work very closely with clinical medical physicists and basic research physicists to implement technologies to improve clinical operation efficiency such as knowledge based automatic proton treatment planning and automatic quality assurance for safety operation of proton therapy.
  • Take the lead on designing and implementing a big database to facility datamining of the proton therapy outcome data using deep learning technology.


KEY FUNCTIONS

Develop the new technology so that MDACC Proton Group should be ahead of technology development in the world

  • Develop all necessary computational infrastructures so that proton center will able to perform single isocenter adaptive Stereotactic Body Proton Therapy routinely
  • Perform all necessary work to dramatically improve the state of art proton therapy delivery such as proton arc therapy based on Synchrotron.
  • Develop all necessary tool to support the new clinical trial such as proton trial based on LET/RBE optimization.
  • Develop the tool for the future particle therapy such as Carbon Therapy Treatment planning.


Develop tools to improve the clinical operation efficiency

  • Develop the computational infrastructure for the commissioning of the new proton therapy center
  • Knowledge based automatic proton treatment planning
  • Automatic plan check
  • Physics QA database to facilitate physics QA automation and automatic error detection
  • Automatic chart printing
  • Improve and propose new automatic patient setup to improve patient treatment workflow
    • Dramatically improve PIAS
    • Surface imaging to facilitate the treatment setup
    • Virtual patient treatment simulation to provide better setup guidance


Build a research infrastructure to facilitate the proton research
  • Work with Radiation Biology group to help biology experiment and process data
    • Develop biology model based on the biology experiment
  • Demonstrate the advantage of proton therapy by using clinical outcome data
  • Build a HPlusQA like database to provide all dosimetric data for all proton patients treated in MDACC. Provide the dosimetric data service for all the researchers.
    • Dosimetric data include dose, MC dose, RBE dose, LET value etc
  • Provide Proton Quantec Model based on MDACC's outcome data
  • Provide auto-contouring service. For outcome data, implementing the auto-contouring software so that any organs can be trained through deep learning technology
  • Provide the deformable registration service to facilitate the data summation
  • Provide the Radiomic data services as well as MRI features data services
  • Provide deep learning service to correlate clinical data and dosimetric data
  • Build a cloud based platform to manage the treatment planning data for multi-center clinical trials


Work with TPS, CT/MRI vendor and other vendors to test and validate new features in TPS or other softwares

  • Test and validate MC in TPS vendors and provide the feedback very early; Test and validate new planning tools in TPS such as LET/RBE based optimization in Raystation etc
  • Evaluate and validate Hitachi TPS
  • Build tools to integrate software from different vendors


QUALIFICATIONS

Education

Required:

  • Bachelor's degree in Biomedical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Physics, Applied Mathematics or related field.


Preferred:

  • PhD degree in Bioinformatics, Statistics, Biology, Computer Science or related field.


Experience

Required:

  • Five years of experience in scientific software development/analysis.
  • With preferred degree, three years experience required.


Preferred:

  • Work experience in the new dose calculation methods and optimization methods.
  • Expert in high performance computing, large database design.
  • Able to design algorithm using the deep learning method.
  • Experience in pattern recognition/machine learning, mathematical/statistical modeling, network analysis
  • Data integration, data mining, NGS data analysis (mutations, structural variations, and expression).
  • Proficiency in at least one programming language such as R, C/C++, Perl, Python, or JAVA.


It is the policy of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center to provide equal employment opportunity without regard to race, color, religion, age, national origin, sex, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, disability, protected veteran status, genetic information, or any other basis protected by institutional policy or by federal, state or local laws unless such distinction is required by law. http://www.mdanderson.org/about-us/legal-and-policy/legal-statements/eeo-affirmative-action.html

Company

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston is one of the world's most respected centers focused on cancer patient care, research, education and prevention. It was named the nation's No. 1 hospital for cancer care in U.S. News & World Report's 2023 rankings. It is one of the nation's original three comprehensive cancer centers designated by the National Cancer Institute.

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