I am honoured to have been given this opportunity by UKRI. The fellowship and the funding provided will undoubtedly impact AINOSTICS as a whole, as it enables us to maintain an active R&D portfolio, expanding from fundamental science to late-stage translation. As part of the programme, we also aim to broaden our collaboration with our key partners, such as the London Medical Imaging & AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare, who have been crucial to our continued growth, making it possible for us to pioneer AI technology for the NHS.
Dr Hojjat Azadbakht, Chief Executive, AINOSTICS
01 September 2022
Partner of the London Medical Imaging & AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare receives UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship
Dr Azadbakht will create new methodologies and methods to identify the signs of dementia earlier and more accurately.
Chief Executive of AINOSTICS, a partner of the London Medical Imaging & AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare (AI4VBH), Dr Hojjat Azadbakht, has received a prestigious UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship award to create new methodologies and methods to identify the signs of dementia earlier and more accurately.
Dr Azadbakht and the team are creating an automated pipeline which allows clinical users to be able to use the state of the art in imaging acquisition and data processing to be able to detect signs of alteration as a result of pathology such as dementia earlier and more accurately.
Clinical users will be able to identify people at risk of developing dementia earlier, for example at a time when emerging treatments have high efficacy but also for clinical trials to be able to identify populations which are suitable for enrolment into the trial.
And then to be able to monitor the efficacy of treatments more accurately and with higher sensitivity.
The fellowship explores the application of various non-invasive MRI scanning technology and acquisitions such as diffusion MRI, which have previously been shown to have sensitivity to the underlying disease processes.
However, some of these techniques such as diffusion MRI are a bit harder to reproduce and get right in terms of acquisition protocol setup, hardware dependence and compliance by the patients in the scanner.
As part of the fellowship the team aim to use technology automations and AI to be able to detect and increase the reproducibility of these acquisitions which in scientific domains have shown to have a lot of promise but due to these factors have had limited uptake in clinical practice and also their full potential hasn’t been explored in pharma trials because of a lack of reproducibility and the niche data processing and computational modelling skills that are required.
I congratulate Dr Azadbakht and the team for this prestigious award which will support innovative and much needed technology to advance earlier detection of neurodegenerative disorders such as dementia and Alzheimer's.
Professor Reza Razavi, Director, London Medical Imaging and AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare
Dr Azadbakht and the team at AINOSTICS are key SME partners for the AI Centre leading on the dementia exemplar project which perfectly exemplifies the unique opportunities created through the AI Centre’s successful model of bringing NHS, academia and industry together. I congratulate Dr Azadbakht and the team on this wonderful achievement.
Professor Sebastien Ourselin FREng, Deputy Director, London Medical Imaging and AI Centre for Value Based Healthcare
UKRI’s flagship Future Leaders Fellowships allow universities and businesses to develop their most talented early career researchers and innovators and to attract new people to their organisations, including from overseas.
According to UKRI, the sixth round of the FLF competition had received a record number of more than 800 applications, with only approximately 10 industry-based applicants being awarded the fellowship, who will benefit from £98 million to tackle major global issues and commercialise their innovations in the UK. What’s even more impressive is that Dr Azadbakht is the first acting CEO of a company to receive this fellowship, acknowledging both his commercial and scientific standing.
Dr Azadbakht’s fellowship will be fully funded by UKRI for an initial period of 4 years, with the potential for an additional 3-year extension.