MR Research Group

McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Imaging ranks high in the nation for funding in basic science research from the National Institutes of Health. Our research in Radiomics with Machine and Deep Learning using PET/ MR imaging, high resolution ultrasound techniques is world class. Below is a brief description of these programs along with our progressive clinical research areas.

Michael A. Jacobs, Ph.D., DABR, is a Professor of Diagnostic and Interventional Imaging, Vice-Chair for Research and the Director of Magnetic Resonance Research at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston. He also holds an Endowed Chair in Biomedical Engineering at UTHealth Houston.

He served on numerous NIH, SBIR, and ACRIN Study Sections. He also serves on the Radiology and Medical Physics Editorial Boards.

Dr. Jacobs’ has a long-standing interest in developing translational imaging metrics for quantitative radiological imaging for improved detection and characterization of different pathologies for diagnosis. My current research interests include developing these methods for the detection, characterization and monitoring of treatment response of many different diseases. In addition, my research efforts been focused on computational and algorithmic methods for application to radiology for precision medicine by creating new advanced machine and deep learning methods, informatics, and radiomics to integrate clinical, radiological, and other data for personalized medicine.

Dr. Jacobs’ directs a state-of-the-art 3T whole body PET/MRI scanner and 7T animal-dedicated MRI with PET insert scanner.

He has been continuously funded by NIH and DARPA for the last 17+ years. He directs the MRI Analysis Center that is involved in analyzing multi-center MRI data.

He has 9 US Patents, 3 World Intellectual Property Organization for Trade Patents, and 7 Pending/Filed. He has authored/coauthored more than 125 publications in peer-reviewed journals and numerous book chapters.