In this project we will focus on four important aspects (requirements) of an end-to-end software environment for performing multiple parallel non-rigid registrations over the Grid. Our application is Image Guided Neurosurgery (IGNS). IGNS is an important tool for neurosurgical resection which is a common therapeutic intervention in the treatment of malignant brain tumors.
The four requirements we will study in this project are: (1) the high-performance of the parallel and distributed non-rigid registration code by dynamically balancing the processors work-load, (2) the ease-of-use from medical doctors (radiologist) of a web-service by developing a Graphical User Interface (GUI) for clients of our web-service (3) the portability of the code to run from a single high-end workstation to more than one clusters of workstations within the local and wide area networks available to research hospitals and medical centers, (4) the reliability by guaranteeing that part of the system will complete the computations for the image registration and by making sure we meet the time constrains by acquiring and re-configuring the system at runtime to compensate for lost (faulty) computing resources.
The end-product will be a prototype of an IGNS web-service. However, this project will have broader impact to image guided therapy because the same framework (but different modalities and finite element approximation models) can be used in prostate biopsy and treatment, and liver cryotherapy.
