Yale Biomedical Imaging Institute

As we move into 2026, I am delighted to reflect on the first year at the Yale Biomedical Imaging Institute. Our journey has been marked by significant growth, groundbreaking research, and transformative collaborations. These achievements are a testament to the dedication and hard work of our exceptional faculty, researchers, staff, and students.

In 2025, we funded our first round of pilot grants to support bold exploratory imaging studies or secondary data analysis studies that foster inter-departmental collaborations on topics that have great potential for high impact on health and disease. We look forward to seeing the results from the first 15 awarded projects.

We held engaging workshops, including a Dean's Workshop, which explored with medical imaging leaders at Yale advancements and opportunities in biomedical imaging technologies and their applications in research and clinical practice. Another notable event was our June workshop with the Center for Brain & Mind Health (CBMH), fostering new collaborative projects and discussions to drive future innovations in neuroimaging.

Our community's achievements were recognized with awards such as the Yale Faculty Innovation Awards and the Linda K. Lorimer Award for Distinguished Service. Our research was published in prominent journals, showcasing advances in understanding brain and other diseases, and developing new imaging technologies.

The institute has grown to over 250 members, each contributing to a dynamic interdisciplinary environment. We continue to prioritize training the next generation of biomedical imaging experts, with over 60 trainees currently engaged in various educational programs and research.

Looking ahead, our goal remains steadfast: to lead in scientific discovery and innovation in medical imaging. In spite of uncertain times, we remain excited about the prospects for the coming year and are confident that through continued collaboration and dedication, we can turn challenges into opportunities.

Thank you all for your engagement, support, and exceptional contributions. Together, we can drive excellence in biomedical imaging research and education at Yale and beyond.

Looking forward to a productive and inspiring 2026.

Sincerely,

Georges El Fakhri, PhD
Director, Yale Biomedical Imaging Institute

Carolyn Fredericks, MD

The primary objective of this proposal is to densely sample a pilot cohort of healthy perimenopausal women, each of whom will undergo an MRI scan twice per cycle in two cycles over the funding year, with sex hormone levels acquired at each timepoint. This will allow us to dynamically assess the relationship between hormone shifts and connectivity to build hypotheses for a larger longitudinal grant investigating the relationship between sex hormones, connectivity, vascular health, and cognitive performance in perimenopausal women.

Jointly funded with Women's Health Research at Yale.

Nicha Dvornek, PhD, & Mert Ozan Bahtiyar, MD

The overarching goal of this proposal is to improve maternal and perinatal/infant outcomes through the development of automated decision support tools for prenatal imaging. Accurately identifying high-risk pregnancy conditions enables treatment planning to prevent poor maternal/infant outcomes. This project will focus on ultrasound (US) for prenatal diagnosis of placenta accreta spectrum (PAS).

Takuya Toyonaga, MD, PhD, & Jason Johnson, MD, MBA

The aims of this project are to evaluate glucose metabolism in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) with unprecedented detail in FDG imaging by leveraging the advanced capabilities of our next-generation PET scanner, NeuroEXPLORER (NX). Precise detection of primary and metastatic lesions is essential for selecting the appropriate treatment strategy, guiding radiation therapy planning, and informing surgical approaches.

Jason Cai, PhD, & Jing Du, PhD

In this project, the PI’s propose a proof-of-concept study to evaluate [11C]PyBic, a novel radiolabeled Poly (ADP-ribose) Polymerase 1 (PARP1) PET imaging tracer designed to enable noninvasive quantification of PARP1 in patients with newly diagnosed early-stage breast cancer. The potential impact of this proposal is to introduce PARP1 PET imaging as a noninvasive biomarker to predict PARPi treatment effects in breast cancer, thereby identifying patients who may benefit from PARPi therapy.

Michelle Hampson, PhD, & Luca Pasquini, PhD

This project proposes to investigate whether prehabilitation with fMRI neurofeedback (NF) incorporated into standard clinical practice can improve surgical outcomes in glioma patients. The hypothesis is that NF training can induce network-level plasticity that shifts language function away from the tumor region prior to surgical resection, thereby leading to improved functional preservation in glioma patients following surgery.

Robin de Graaf, PhD, & Rich Carson, PhD

This project aims to provide a multimodal method to non-invasively characterize brain-wide GABA levels. If successful, it will improve interpretability for MRS measurements of GABA and other metabolites, addressing a critical barrier to progress in the field and can be applied to a variety of neurological and psychiatric conditions including schizophrenia, autism, and Alzheimer’s disease. etc.

Maeva Dhaynaut, PhD, & Sule Tinaz, MD, PhD

The goal of this project is to provide the first human evidence linking NOP receptor signaling to Parkinson’s Disease (PD) characteristics and establish feasibility for larger, externally funded studies. [¹¹C]NOP-1A is a high-affinity PET radioligand that provides reliable quantification of NOP receptor availability in vivo but has never been applied to PD. Addressing this gap will provide a conceptual advance by moving beyond dopamine-focused imaging to a neuromodulatory system that may explain both motor impairment and dyskinesia, with clear therapeutic implications.

Xiaosi Gu, PhD, & Ifat Levy, PhD

The overarching goal of this proposal is to identify the neural computations that underlie the interplay between food- and alcohol-related craving and choices, leveraging computational modeling. This study will contribute to the identification of the computational mechanisms of craving-choice dynamics that are shared by or unique to food and alcohol craving, thus contributing to a mechanistic understanding of the complexity of human craving and related addictive choices.

Graeme Mason, PhD

This project seeks to understand the acute effects of ethanol and to shed light on acute and chronic tolerance to alcohol, as well as the pattern of metabolite changes measured with 1H-MRS in heavy social drinkers and alcohol-dependent patients. There currently is little understanding of the acute effects of ethanol on cortical GABA or glutamate levels in humans as well as other relevant metabolite levels that may be measured in humans with proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H-MRS)

Gustavo Angarita, MD, MHS

The proposed study aims to test whether psilocybin, a serotonergic psychedelic with demonstrated synaptogenic properties in preclinical models, can reverse opioid-induced synaptic deficits in humans with opioid use disorder (OUD). The results could contribute to establishing PET-derived synaptic density as a novel biomarker for treatment response in addiction.

Margaret Davis, PhD

The goal of this project is to clarify the role of the kappa opioid receptor (KOR) in the pathophysiology of borderline personality disorder (BPD), and comorbid opioid use disorder (OUD; BPD-OUD). BPD is a condition associated with alarmingly high rates of morbidity and mortality, but few effective pharmacological interventions. Understanding the pathophysiology of BPD-OUD is critical to the development of potentially life-saving interventions tailored to this high-risk population.

Chao Ma, PhD, & Henk De Feyter, PhD

The aims of this project are to produce a novel free-breathing 3D cardiac 31P-MRSI method that significantly outperforms the existing methods in terms of resolution, SNR, imaging speed, and motion correction; this will be used to measure myocardial PCr/ATP ratios to advance understanding of the mechanism of GLP-1RA in improving mitochondrial dysfunction and cardiac functions in obesity patients.

Dana Peters, PhD, & Stephanie Thorn, PhD

Late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) is an important cardiac MRI tool; the goal of this proposal is to leverage the shorter T1s of blood, myocardium and scar provided by Gadopiclenol, to improve LGE quality which is hypothesized to result in improved LGE imaging for guiding AF and VT ablations (where scar patterns matter), and will also dramatically improve left atrial LGE, which is severely limited by low spatial resolution.

Thibault Marin, PhD, & Jean-Dominique Gallezot, PhD

The goal of this project is to develop, evaluate and apply a novel dynamic image reconstruction algorithm to improve image quality in dynamic positron emission tomography (PET) studies; the proposed method, based on subspace modeling, aims to reduce noise in dynamic PET. The LR-PET method will be implemented within the YRT-PET framework.

John Onofrey, PhD, & Tamar Taddei, MD

The proposed research aims to enhance the quantitative analysis of digital whole slide imaging (WSI) to precisely assess histological differences between HIV and non-HIV related hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). This will be addressed through the development of novel, robust deep learning-based image analysis methods to learn and summarize the hierarchical relationships of WSI histology patterns, essentially capturing the spatial organization and interactions within the tissue.

On Oct. 21, 2025, the Yale Biomedical Imaging Institute was highlighted in a Dean’s Workshop at The Anlyan Center auditorium. The workshop showcased advancements in biomedical imaging technologies and their applications in research and medicine.

Nancy J. Brown, MD, dean of Yale School of Medicine, opened the workshop, emphasizing the interdisciplinary nature of imaging in research and patient care. Director Georges El Fakhri, PhD, followed with an overview of ongoing projects and collaborations at the Institute, highlighting pilot funding, a cancer center forum, and extensive renovations to the imaging facilities.

The workshop featured sessions on imaging technologies, including PET advancements by Marc D. Normandin, PhD, and MRI technologies by Henk De Feyter, PhD. The translation of these technologies into clinical practice was discussed, with Carolyn Fredericks, MD, addressing imaging in neurodegeneration and Pamela L. Kunz, MD, speaking on theranostics in cancer treatment.

Thibault Marin, PhD, and John Onofrey, PhD, emphasized the role of imaging data sciences in radiation oncology and breast/prostate imaging, while Nicha Dvornek, PhD, highlighted interdisciplinary approaches. The afternoon sessions included success stories from Kelly Cosgrove, PhD and Albert Sinusas, MD, showcasing PET research and the work at Yale Translational Research Imaging Center (Y-TRIC).

A strategic roundtable moderated by El Fakhri wrapped up the event, featuring chairs from various imaging-intensive departments discussing opportunities for innovation and collaboration.

The workshop concluded with a networking session and poster presentations. Recordings of the workshop are available online.

Co-hosted by the Center for Brain & Mind Health (CBMH) and the Biomedical Imaging Institute, this workshop, held June 11, 2025, aimed to bring our communities together and pioneer the next generation of brain research through imaging.

The workshop included presentations covering recent advances in representative brain health areas, an update on existing and emerging neuroimaging tools and technologies, and big data harmonization. It also included small-group sessions for brainstorming and development of new collaborative projects, as well as a poster session.