Events

Dr. Chris Williams, Brigham & Women's Hospital

MRI-Guided Adaptive Radiation Therapy: Improving Precision in Cancer Therapy

Radiation therapy treatments have traditionally used x-ray imaging to ensure that a patient is accurately positioned before treating them with a beam of ionizing radiation. In the past several years, new treatment machines have been developed that combine magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) systems with linear accelerators, enabling MRI-guidance before and during treatment delivery. These devices have the potential to improve our ability to visualize and treat soft-tissue tumors as well as to compensate for motion and changes in a patient’s anatomy.

Kristy McQuinn, Rutgers University

The Baryon Cycle in the Smallest of Star-Forming Galaxies

Our view of galaxy evolution has expanded to include not just the evolution of individual galaxy components (gas, stars, chemical elements), but the cyclical interplay of a galaxy with its surroundings. Frequently termed the 'baryon cycle', the galaxy evolution framework now includes: how gas is accreted onto galaxies, turned in stars, ejected out of galaxies via energetic feedback processes, and potentially re-accreted.

Peter M. Hoffmann Wayne State University

The Physics of Life: Molecular Machines

Living beings are based on nanoscale machinery. This is no accident: the nanoscale is the only length scale at which autonomous, self-constructing machinery is possible. Only at this scale do thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical energy scales converge. Moreover, this scale is dominated by thermal chaos. These unique circumstances give nanoscale systems the ability to easily transform different types of energy into each other and to self-assemble into ordered structures. Although living cells have taken advantage of the physics of the nanoscale for billions of years, technology is just beginning to exploit the very different rules governing this scale.