Bernd Fischer Award 2017

The Bernd Fischer Award 2017 for an outstanding PhD thesis in the Departments of Computer Science or Natural Sciences is awarded to Dr.-Ing. Tobias Wissel for his dissertation on "Tissue Thickness Estimation from Backscattered Light – A Novel Concept for Optical Head Tracking in Radiotherapy” at the Institute of Robotics and Cognitive Systems, supervised by Prof. Dr. Floris Ernst.

Tobias Wissel, born in Lutherstadt Wittenberg in 1985, studied electrical engineering at Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg (Dipl.-Ing.) and embedded systems at the University of Essex, UK (M.Sc.). From 2011 to 2016, he completed his PhD at the Graduate School and Institute of Robotics and Cognitive Systems at the University of Lübeck. His thesis was awarded summa cum laude by the university's examination committee. The research project associated with his thesis was developed in a team of three doctoral students under the supervision of Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Floris Ernst and Prof. Dr.-Ing. Achim Schweikard.

In this application-oriented project, the industrial partner and world market leader for radiation systems, Varian Medical Systems, together with the Institute of Robotics, pursued the development of a novel head motion tracking system for radiation therapy of head tumors. The developed concept uses machine learning algorithms to derive tissue thickness information from near-infrared backscatter patterns in the head and forehead area, which are recorded during LASER scanning of the head during treatment. This information ultimately yields characteristic patterns on the scanned 3D surfaces, so that movements of these surfaces, and thus of the underlying tumor tissue, can be tracked with high precision over time. High clinical relevance results not only from precision, but also from applicability to small surface sections with little spatial variation, such as the forehead. This can lead to the abandonment of conventional fixation methods.
Dr. Wissel was able to demonstrate the feasibility of the concept in collaboration with the Institute of Neuroradiology and the Institute of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, both clinical institutes of the university and its hospital.

The project work has resulted in several patents and ready-to-use prototypes, which are currently being further developed in projects at the Institute of Robotics. Dr. Wissel himself has been working in the Hamburg research laboratories of Philips GmbH Innovative Technologies in the field of digital imaging for medical technology since February 2016.

The Bernd Fischer Award has been awarded since 2016 and commemorates the mathematician Prof. Dr. Bernd Fischer (1957 - 2013). As the Head of the Institute of Mathematics and Image Computing and Luebeck`s Fraunhofer Project Group on Image Registration (MEVIS) Professor Fischer played a major role in establishing the field of computer science at the university. He was extremely committed and popular among his colleagues and his students for his excellent teaching, his extraordinary research and his work on behalf of the university.
The award is endowed with 2,500 euros and is awarded annually by the Association of Alumni and Friends of the University of Luebeck.