Students from Riga Technical University, Riga Stradins University, and University of Latvia are participating in the distinctive «INNO HEALTH HUB» program, and developing four solutions that will help significantly improve cancer diagnosis and patient care. Taking advantage of international representation opportunities, teams participate in an ambitious precision medicine forum.
The INNO HEALTH HUB program is organized by the RTU Development Fund and the RTU Science and Innovation Center Design Factory, with the support of the Latvian technology company MikroTik. In total, 29 students from different academic levels are involved in the program.
Over the course of seven months, the students will pursue solutions to two challenges related to the analysis of big data or genomic data in cancer diagnostics - the use of big data in the genetics, diagnosis and prognosis of malignant tumors in pediatrics, and the use of artificial intelligence in the analysis of big or genomic data for early detection for cancer diagnosis in high resolution images.
Students have been divided into four teams. The «19%» team is creating a support tool for family doctors that will help make the early diagnosis of bowel cancer possible, using large language models in structuring and analyzing histology results. The RedFlags team is developing an online platform where parents can enter their child’s health information prior to a family doctor visit. The data is analyzed so when admitting the patient, the family doctor can both review the health information and receive a summary of the «red flags» of the disease.
The «Alternative» team is developing a tool that will improve oncology diagnostics with the help of computer vision, providing fast analysis of radiograms and providing real-time support to health care specialists. The PrevenGS team is creating a next-generation genome sequencing transcriptome tool that would be able to determine and analyze the gene expression of a cancer patient.
In developing solutions, teams receive financial and mentor support, as well as the opportunity to use RTU’s HPC (High Performance Computing) infrastructure.
The teams presented their work at the international Precision Medicine Networking (PMNET) forum, which gathered more than 50 world-leading experts in precision medicine in Riga on October 12 and 13. Precision medicine is a new approach to disease treatment and prevention that considers each person's genetic diversity, environment, and lifestyle.
