The Annual UCSF Radiology Research Conference was held at beautiful Chaminade Resort in 2024, and we got perfect weather (and some nice afternoon free time to enjoy it!).

The Body Imaging Group Hot Topics lecture was given by breast cancer imaging research scientists, Wen Li, PhD, and Lisa Wilmes, PhD, on “Diffusion-weighted MRI for improving individualized breast cancer treatment”. They showed an impressive body of work developing DW-MRI and the associated ADC biomarker for distiction of aggressive tumors and prediction of progression. This includes quantification improvements using specialized phantoms and gradient non-linearity corrections as well as the use of multi-shot and reduced FOV methods to improve SNR and reduce distortion.

We also were repesented by Prof. Daehyun Yoon’s New Faculty Presentation “Imaging of Pain: Questions that led me to UCSF” and the Intelligent Imaging presentation by Rupsa Bhattacharjee, PhD on “Emerging Role of AI in Low-field MSK MR”.

In a faculty meeting presentation, I highlighted opportunities I see in

• Liver Cancer and Liver Disease, where we have lots of expertise and interest
• Breast Cancer, where there is an underused MammiPET system and productive opportunities with Integration of AI Research
• A Prostate Cancer Symposium to communicate amongst our many researchers in this are
• Leverage multiple new MRI resources - the 9.4 T Bruker small-animal, 0.55 T whole-body clinical, and the soon to come high-performance Cima.X 3T scanners

Finally, there were excellent personal/professional development sessions on Public Speaking and Mindful Priorities Management. I especially enjoyed the strategy of taking 10-15 minutes to write out (just from your head, no looking at emails/etc) upcoming projects, and break them down into some action items. This really resonates with me, and doing this before getting bogged down in meetings/emails/etc!