PhD Scholarship in Computer Science
Scholarship for Doctorate program on Biomedical Signal Processing
Study Subject: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common sustained arrhythmia encountered in clinical practice. Radiofrequency catheter ablation is becoming one of the most popular therapies for the treatment of the disease. Yet inconsistent success rates are being reported from different centers practicing the therapy.
The present investigation aims at the development of signal processing techniques to achieve a more careful selection of persistent AF patients who may actually benefit from ablation. The novelty of the proposed approach lies in a thorough characterization of the atrial signal recorded in the surface electrocardiogram (ECG), by exploiting a variety of dimensions such as its space, time, frequency and shape structures. Based on this multidimensional characterization, the most discriminant properties predicting ablation outcome will be determined by suitable feature extraction and selection techniques. The present investigation is expected to lead not only to improved success rates but also to significant reductions in the duration, cost and potential complications of the catheter ablation therapy for AF.
Building upon past experience of the I3S Laboratory’s Signal team on the non-invasive analysis of AF through array signal processing techniques, the successful candidate will work in close collaboration with specialists from Nice Pasteur University Hospital and Monaco Princess Grace Hospital Cardiology Departments.
Prerequisites: Prospective candidates will require a strong theoretical background in mathematics, statistics and signal processing. Previous experience with biomedical signals, in particular the ECG, and familiarity with cardiac electrophysiology will also be highly desirable assets.
The Computer Science, Signals and Systems Laboratory in Sophia Antipolis (www.i3s.unice.fr): The Laboratoire d’Informatique, Signaux et Systèmes de Sophia Antipolis (I3S) constitutes a joint research unit of the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the University of Nice – Sophia Antipolis (UNS). The I3S Lab is located in the sunny French Riviera, at the heart of the Sophia Antipolis technology park, sometimes referred to as the “European Silicon Valley”. The park is composed of a large number of international companies and research institutes (such as INRIA and Eurecom) in the general fields of information and communication science and technology (STIC), biological and environmental sciences, and chemistry. The I3S Lab features a broad multidisciplinary portfolio associating pure and applied research, and encompassing diverse research areas in the field of STIC such as signal and image processing, robotics, communications, control theory, optimization, algorithmics and combinatorics, software technology and hardware architectures, as well as their applications.
An important part of the research carried out by the Signal team at I3S concerns the processing, analysis and modeling of biomedical signals. Its main areas of interest include cardiac electrical activity (comprising both surface ECG and endocavitary recordings, atrial and ventricular fibrillation, body surface potential mapping, and relationships with sleep apnea), cardiorespiratory system coupling (both in effort and in rest conditions, rhythm variability), brain electrical activity (EEG, sleep microstructure, early and late evoked potentials), muscular electrical activity (surface EMG), and auditory conditions (hearing aids, cochlear implants, tinnitus). In trying to meet the medical demand, the group has also produced a number of theoretical results related to the modeling of physiological systems as well as general-purpose signal processing tools for shape analysis and clustering, blind source separation, and time delay estimation. These researches are carried out in close collaboration with clinical and industrial partners.
Starting date: January 2011
Please send a CV, list of BSc/MSc marks, contact details of three references, and a motivation letter to zarzoso-at-i3s.unice.fr.
Scholarship Application Deadline: Contact Employer
Study Subject: Biomedical Signal Processing
Employer: Laboratory for Computer Science, Signals and Systems in Sophia-Antipolis
Level: PhD
