bart ter haar romeny

biography

Part IV: 2001-2017

A visual story.

This period covers:
- Biomedical Image Analysis group @ TU/e

Biomedical Image Analysis group

2001-2017

In 2001 Eindhoven University of Technology established a new Department of Biomedical Engineering, and I was invited by the enthousiastic dean, prof. Jan Janssen, to be one of the founding professors, with a chair in Biomedical Image Analysis. It was an amazing feeling and wonderful start to feel so welcome by being invited. 

A wonderful team

For my new team I needed people with a strong background in physics, in visualization, and in design programming. I could persuade Luc Florack to follow me from Utrecht to Eindhoven, found Anna Vilanova for nD image visualization research and Markus van Almsick (with a background in theoretical physics) strong in Mathematica. 

Luc Florack

Theoretical physics, leading the multi-scale computer vision research. Currently professor in Mathematical Image Analysis at TU/e.

I could persuade Luc Florack to follow me from Utrecht to Eindhoven. I was convinced that the 'brain-inspired' geometric approach, which we pioneered with prof. Koenderink in Utrecht, was the way forward to make solid progress in modern computer-aided diagnosis in medical imaging. He was looking for a new position, and was the ideal person to lead our multi-scale differential geometric image analysis research. A wonderful match.

Anna Vilanova

Computer science, graduated in Visualization in Vienna with Eduard Groeller. Currenly professor in Scientific Visualization at TU/e.

Anna Vilanova had just graduated from Vienne Technical University with a cum laude PhD in scientific visualization (under prof. Eduard Groeller, 'die Meister'). Her husband did a PhD with Philips in Eindhoven, and she was looking for a job in Eindhoven. A wonderful match.

Markus van Almsick

Theoretical physics, evangelist for Mathematica. Currently leading the image processing development group at Wolfram Research.

Markus van Almsick did a PhD in theoretical physics in Germany, but followed his professor to Champaign, IL, USA. There he got enthousiastic about Mathematica. When returning to Europe again, we found each other. In my new group he could finish his PhD, and support me with the education and research with Mathematica. Again, a wonderful match.

BioMIM lab

In combination with the BioInformatics Group of my colleague prof. Peter Hilbers (BioModeling and BioInformatics) we established the new BioMIM lab from scratch, for our PhD and MSc students. We shared a large lab space with student desks and an excellent computing infrastructure (including a 8x Geforce GTX 1080 GPU server for deep learning research and applications).

I was excellently supported by the BME board, in grant applications, personnel affairs, setting up collaborations. Our Dean, Frank Baaijens, took care of us all, later succeeded by Peter Hilbers. Our BME general manager Rob Debey always had an open door to discuss my projects and plans, and gave me much support.  

Peter Hilbers

Frank Baaijens

Rob Debey

Collaboration with Philips Healthcare

In close collaboration with Philips Healthcare, of which the campus was only 12 km away in Best, we developed a wide range of modern computer-aided diagnosis applications. Prof. Frans Gerritsen, head of the Philips Healthcare Medical Image Analysis group, was Philips-appointed guest professor in my group (later followed up by prof. Marcel Breeuwer) for one day/week. They much supported my team. We closely collaborated on the design of a new generation of radiological workstations (EasyVision), and many medical imaging applications, see the PhD theses below (and many of the around 150 Master students that did a one-year project with us).

Focus areas of research

Every year we went with all professors of Biomedical Engineering for a managment retreat. Here 12-04-2006 in Castle Vaalsbroek. 

From left to right:

Frank Baaijens
Klaas Nicolay
Bart ter Haar Romeny
Frans van de Vosse
Mark Post
Bert Meijer
Marcel van Genderen
Peter Hilbers
Rob Debey

Bram van​ Ginneken
Radbout Universty Njmegen

Bart ter Haar Romeny
Eindhoven Universty of Technology

Wiro Niessen
Erasmus Universty Rotterdam

My cousin, Bas ter Haar Romeny (right), is professor of Ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern History at the Free University of Amsterdam (URL).
14-09-2007

Click here for an overview of the PhD students
and PostDocs

PhD students and PostDocs
TU/e campus
CONTINUE WITH BIOGRAPHY: 2005-2017 (CHINA)