DrPedroFerreira

Faculty of Medicine, National Heart & Lung Institute

Honorary Research Fellow

Contact

p.f.ferreira05

Location

Sydney StreetRoyal Brompton Campus

Summary

I am a Senior Image Processing and Data Scientist based at the Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance unit, Royal Brompton Hospital. I have a background in Physics and Mathematics, a PhD in MRI Physics (Imperial College :: London), and an extensive experience in MRI research.

Since 2012, I have been working closely with a team of physicists and clinicians in diffusion tensor cardiovascular magnetic resonance (DT-CMR). It is a novel technique for the investigation of the 3-dimensional microstructure of the heart in-vivo. We aim to improve the understanding of how the healthy heart functions as well as how microstructural dysfunction contributes to disease.

I am focused on creating specialised tools to perform data analysis, image processing, and data visualisation, with a recent interest in finding solutions with AI.

Left ventricle tractography

Highlights

We developed and validated a fully automated postprocessing framework for in vivo diffusion tensor cardiac magnetic resonance (DT-CMR) data powered by deep learning semantic segmentation (TensorFlow):

Ferreira PF, Martin RR, Scott AD, Khalique Z, Yang G, Nielles-Vallespin S, Pennell DJ, Firmin DN. Automating in vivo cardiac diffusion tensor postprocessing with deep learning-based segmentation. Magn Reson Med. 2020.

We published in vivo studies showing that secondary directions of diffusion align with the laminar organisation of cardiomyocytes in the heart, and that cardiomyopathy hearts present impaired mobility:

Ferreira, P. F., Kilner, P. J., McGill, L.A., et al. In vivo cardiovascular magnetic resonance diffusion tensor imaging shows evidence of abnormal myocardial laminar orientations and mobility in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. J Cardiovasc Magn Reson (2014): 87. 2015 winner of the SCMR Gerald Pohost best manuscript award.
Nielles-Vallespin, S., Khalique, Z., Ferreira, P. F., et al. Assessment of Myocardial Microstructural Dynamics by In Vivo Diffusion Tensor Cardiac Magnetic Resonance. J Am Coll Cardiol (2017): 661-676. 2017. Orloff Science Award (NIH, Bethesda MD, USA)

Previous academic education:

2005 - 2009: PhD in Myocardial Perfusion Imaging with MR, Imperial College, London, UK.
2004 - 2005: MSc in Medical Engineering and Physics, King’s College, University of London, UK.
1998 - 2004: First Degree in Physics / Applied Mathematics (Astrophysics), Faculty of Sciences, University of Porto, Portugal.

Publications

Journals

Huang J, Ferreira P, Wang L, et al.Huang J, Ferreira P, Wang L, Wu Y, Aviles-Rivero A, Schonlieb C-B, Scott A, Khalique Z, Dwornik D, Rajakulasingam R, De Silva R, Pennell D, Nielles-Vallespin S, Yang G close, 2024, Deep Learning-based Diffusion Tensor Cardiac Magnetic Resonance Reconstruction: A Comparison Study, Scientific Reports, ISSN:2045-2322

Huo Z, Wen K, Luo Y, et al.Huo Z, Wen K, Luo Y, Neji R, Kunze KP, Ferreira PF, Pennell DJ, Scott AD, Nielles-Vallespin S close, 2024, Referenceless Nyquist ghost correction outperforms standard navigator-based method and improves efficiency of in vivo diffusion tensor cardiovascular magnetic resonance, Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, ISSN:0740-3194

Roehl M, Conway M, Ghonim S, et al.Roehl M, Conway M, Ghonim S, Ferreira P, Nielles-Vallespin S, Babu-Narayan S, Pennell D, Gatehouse P, Scott A close, 2024, STEAM-SASHA: A novel approach for blood and fat suppressed native T1 measurement in the right ventricular myocardium, Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine, ISSN:0968-5243

Zheng Y, Chan WX, Nielles-Vallespin S, et al.Zheng Y, Chan WX, Nielles-Vallespin S, Scott AD, Ferreira PF, Leo HL, Yap CH close, 2023, Effects of myocardial sheetlet sliding on left ventricular function, Biomechanics and Modeling in Mechanobiology, Vol:22, ISSN:1617-7940, Pages:1313-1332

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