The primary aim of the project was to increase the treatment efficacy of biofilm infections arising from joint replacements. To accomplish this, the lab examined novel contrast agents, bone cement compositions and local delivery techniques. Through these methods we hoped to increase the general knowledge of local mass transport characteristics and achievable antibiotics concentrations. I had two independent focuses within the research that helped visualize local delivered antibiotic concentrations. First, I created a novel Matlab program which calculated three dimensional concentration distributions of an MRI contrast agent from T1 maps of a rabbit femur. The development of the program required a significant amount of creative troubleshooting such as the integration of an adaptive threshold sub function which removed a majority of the noise based on local concentration extremes. My second role combined fluorescent imaging with MRI to compare diffusion in vitro. To achieve this I labeled antibiotics with a fluorescent labeler and mixed the solution with MRI contrast agent. Using this mixture I acquired T1 maps and fluorescent images of the solution (right). After running the T1 maps through the Matlab program, I determined correlations between the two diffusion coefficients. My accumulated work was summarized in my undergraduate honors thesis, senior capstone design project and multiple ASU poster symposiums and oral presentations.

The aims of this project were to enhance understanding of drug delivery in the treatment of deadly brain tumors using a three-dimensional computer model. Initial results from the model showed that convection enhanced delivery could provide increased drug distribution over conventional methods. Using image processing techniques, I developed a method for quantifying drug coverage in a target area based on catheter placement and influx parameters (below). This process would be used to aid in developing patient specific treatment options.