2025 International Workshop on Pulmonary Imaging

SUMMARY This application requests funding to support the 2025 International Workshop on Pulmonary Imaging, a three- day meeting to be held from February 20-22, 2025, and the eighth iteration of this workshop to take place at the University of Pennsylvania. The majority of requested funds will be used to cover the cost of travel and lodging

for junior researchers—undergraduate and graduate students, as well as postdoctoral fellows and junior faculty—presenting at the workshop. A smaller portions of these funds will be allocated to help pay for publication costs related to workshop materials as well as live webcasting so that interested individuals around the world

who are unable to attend in-person still have the opportunity to view and participate in the proceedings. As pulmonary disease represents the third leading cause of mortality worldwide (rising to almost 4 million deaths annually), there is an increasing need for novel imaging techniques to provide earlier/more accurate diagnoses

and improved treatment monitoring. The field of pulmonary imaging is more expansive today than ever— spanning an unprecedented range of techniques for structural, functional and molecular lung assessments being developed across the disciplines of physics, biology, engineering, chemistry, computer science, medicine and

more. Given its rapidly-evolving nature, the existence of a regular forum in which scientists and clinicians in the field can meet with and communicate their ideas to one another is of the utmost importance. In the absence of other scientific meetings with a similarly focused agenda, our previous workshops have succeeded in providing

just such a forum—creating a valuable opportunity for rigorous, collaborative exchange. The specific aims of the proposed workshop are as follows: (1) host a one-day workshop on pulmonary fibrosis; (2) keep the pulmonary imaging community informed regarding the most recent developments in structural,

functional and molecular lung imaging; (3) investigate the use pulmonary imaging to non-invasively assess treatment efficacy for interstitial lung diseases (ILDs); (4) explore novel approaches for integrating deep learning with pulmonary imaging to improve diagnosis and phenotyping and predict disease progression; (5) broadcast

the full workshop program live online, allowing interested parties free, real-time access to the proceedings. Finally, we intend to hold a one-day boot camp the day before the conference focused on pulmonary fibrosis. This boot camp will consist of ~5 one-hour presentations on topics related to this central theme, with significant

question and answer time, and a final discussion panel during which the goal will be to synthesize the most important issues covered over the course of the event. Finally, the 2025 workshop will expand its focus to include new dedicated sessions on topics such as pulmonary vascularization, small airways disease, ILDs—and

specifically idioopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF)—while also the maintaining recent emphasis on assessing treatment response through imaging, the integration of deep / machine learning techniques, and bridging the gap between current clinical practice and innovative imaging technologies.