CISE Seminar: November 30, 2018, Raimund Ober, Texas A&M University

8 St. Mary’s Street, PHO 211
3:00pm-4:00pm – Refreshments at 2:45pm

Raimund Ober
Texas A&M University

Quantitative Aspects of the Analysis of Single Molecule Experiments

The possibility to image individual molecules in a cellular environment has been realized relatively recently due to advances in detection and sample preparation technologies. Single molecule microscopy has the potential to reveal significant new insights into biological processes and the molecular level. Over recent years the new methodology has made major progress. What is a distinguishing feature over most other microscopy techniques is that image and signal analysis is integral to the approach. For example, in the localization based superresolution microscopy approach (for which the 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded) the resulting image can only be arrived at through image analysis and the improvement in the resolution over conventional techniques depends directly on the accuracy with which the single molecule positions can be localized.

In this seminar we will present some of our work that employs an information theoretic approach to the characterization of single molecule microscopy experiments. We will also discuss resolution and questions of camera characterization.

After studies of Mathematics and Physics at the University of Tuebingen, Germany, Raimund Ober continued his studies at Cambridge University, UK, where he received Masters degrees in Mathematics and Engineering, followed by a Ph.D. in Engineering that he completed in 1983. He then held a Research Fellowship at Girton College Cambridge University. In 1990 he was appointed Assistant Professor at University of Texas at Dallas where he rose through to Full Professor. In 2014 he moved to Texas A&M University where we held a joint appointment in the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Molecular Medicine in the College of Medicine. Since 2018 he is Professor of Biomedical Imaging in the Centre for Cancer Immunology at the University of Southampton, UK. His research interests focus on the development of microscopy methodologies, in particular, data analysis approaches for single molecule microscopy. In collaboration with his wife E. Sally Ward he shares a joint laboratory that also focuses on the development of antibody based therapeutics for autoimmune and cancer treatment. Raimund Ober is a fellow of the SPIE.

Faculty Host: Sean Andersson
Student Host: Artin Spiridonoff