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Transforming Health Care

Moderator: Barbara Liskov
Dennis Freeman MS '76, PhD '86 Martha L. Gray SM '81, PhD '86 Peter Szolovits Eric Grimson: May 23, 2003; Running Time: 1:31:31

About the Lecture

About the Lecture

MIT research is helping to speed the diagnosis of disease, and easing our most common afflictions.

Dennis Freeman is working on a better hearing aid. He describes how our ears can perceive sounds that make the eardrum vibrate less than the diameter of a hydrogen atom. He envisions a computer chip that will emulate sensitive cells in our inner ear that both react to sounds and communicate them to the brain.

Martha Gray is developing methods to look inside joint tissue, at the molecular level, to diagnose arthritis early enough for useful therapies. An estimated one in three Americans suffer from this painful disease.

Fifty to 100 thousand people a year are killed by medical errors. Peter Szolovits imagines a computer health record devised and controlled by a patient over a lifetime, which could play a key role in avoiding mistakes in medical diagnosis and treatment.

Eric Grimson says the imaging techniques he’s developing will bring nothing short of a revolution in surgery. His animated, 3D models are strikingly successful at guiding surgeons before and during such high-wire acts as the removal of brain tumors.

Lecture Details

Location: Kresge

About the Speakers

Moderator: Barbara Liskov

Institute Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory

Barbara Liskov has served at MIT since 1972. Previously, she worked at Mitre Corporation in computer science research and development. Liskov received her B.A. in mathematics from Stanford University, and her M.S. and Ph.D. from Stanford in computer science.

Liskov was named one of the 50 most important women in science by Discover Magazine. She is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She won the 2008 Turing Award, and the IEEE 2004 John von Neumann Medal.

Dennis Freeman MS '76, PhD '86

Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering

Martha L. Gray SM '81, PhD '86

Edward Hood Taplin Professor of Medical and Electrical Engineering Co-Director, Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences & Technology

Martha Gray's research is geared towards understanding and ultimately preventing or slowing the cartilage degeneration that affects at least 6 out of 10 people over age 45.

Gray received her B.S.in computer science from Michigan State University, her S.M.in electrical engineering and Ph.D. in medical engineering from MIT. She is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering and on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Orthopaedic Research.