Muhammad Naeem Akram Interned at Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine in Germany
Computer science Ph.D. student Muhammad Naeem Akram spent his summer at a distinguished research center in Germany learning the practical applications of his doctoral studies. Akram creates computational meshes of real-world objects; they are essentially high-resolution, 3D computer representations that can aid in rendering, visualization and geometric processing.
At the 葫芦影业鈥檚 College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Akram specifically works with quadrilateral meshes and hexahedral meshes, their theory and application. However, he faced a new challenge this summer when he was required to work with triangular meshes to help biomedical researchers in Germany.
Akram received a , which provided the opportunity to intern at , one of the largest interdisciplinary research centers in Europe, located in J眉lich, Germany.
The German Academic Exchange Service administers the DAAD RISE program. Its goal is to promote international academic cooperation through student exchanges.
鈥淚鈥檓 really glad I made it here,鈥 Akram said about his internship. 鈥淚 got to interact with new people, and I got to learn the practical aspect of my research. I鈥檝e taken courses, but I鈥檝e never seen a practical application for the concepts I鈥檝e learned.鈥
His internship began July 5 at the center鈥檚 , where he would spend a few days in person and a few days working from home.
Digital Representations of Human Brain
For his summer internship, Akram worked on building a 3D, high-resolution digital representation of the human brain. The process began with medical researchers cutting thin slices from a preserved brain, then taking high-resolution, 1 nanometer images of the slices. Next, the images were stacked to build volumetric data, and 3D meshes were generated from the volumetric data.
鈥淭he meshes generated from the volumetric data have a high complexity,鈥 Akram said.
Because it is so intricate and there is a great amount of data, it takes time for medical researchers to load the meshes in a viewer on their computer. Therefore, he explains, it is necessary to have a simpler graphic 鈥 that鈥檚 where his research comes into play.
鈥淚 worked on two parts,鈥 he said. 鈥淭he first one was to simplify the mesh to reduce its complexity; the second part was to optimize the mesh.鈥
He used a computational objective function to both reduce the complexity and to optimize, which is a new approach to solve the problems.
鈥淥ne of the aspects of the project is to get different levels of details for the meshes,鈥 said Akram. 鈥淎s you zoom in to the model of the brain, you can gradually load more complex meshes until you reach the highest complexity mesh that represents the actual brain model that was generated from the real-world data.鈥
Akram borrowed an idea from his Ph.D. project to optimize the mesh. His advisor is Guoning Chen.
"I would like to thank Dr. Guoning Chen for his supervision during my Ph.D. studies,鈥 he said. 鈥淯nder his mentorship, I was able to get a deeper and thorough understanding of geometric processing, especially mesh simplification and optimization. I was able to utilize the knowledge and concepts I learned through research under Dr. Chen's guidance for the summer internship."
In turn, Chen describes Akram as a talented and organized student.
鈥淢uhammad Naeem always shows respect to others and follows directions really well,鈥 Chen said. 鈥淗e always gets his coding, experiments, and written and oral presentations done. He is mature and very humble, and I am happy to work with him.鈥
Observing and Learning Communication Within Research Center
Akram鈥檚 work will enable neuroscientists to study one portion of the brain through their viewer.
鈥淭hey can look at the cross sections of the brain, and they can study the structure of cells, the organization of cells and the organization of neurons and fibers in the brain, to use in their own research,鈥 said Akram.
The multidisciplinary work among neuroscientists, computer scientists and engineers was also a learning experience for the young researcher.
鈥淚 got to see how those different departments communicate with each other,鈥 he said, 鈥渢o work towards one project, which is to accurately present a very high-resolution 3D representation of the brain.鈥
Akram鈥檚 internship ended September 10. He plans to graduate in 2023.
- Rebeca Trejo, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics