The MAGIC-5 Project: Medical Applications on a Grid Infrastructure Connection

The MAGIC-5 Project aims at developing ComputerAided Detection (CAD) software for Medical Applicationson distributed databases by means of GRID Services. Theuse of automated systems for analyzing medical images hasbeen demonstrated to improve the radiologist performance. Inaddition, it could be of paramount importance in screeningprograms, due to the huge amount of data to check and the costof related manpower. The need for acquiring and analyzing datastored in different locations requires the use of GRID Servicesfor the management of distributed computing resources and data.GRID technologies allow remote image analysis and interactiveonline diagnosis, with a relevant reduction of the delays presentlyassociated to the diagnosis in screening programs. The MAGIC-5project develops algorithms for the analysis of mammographiesfor breast cancer detection, Computed-Tomography (CT) imagesfor lung cancer detection and Positron Emission Tomography(PET) imaging for the early diagnosis of the Alzheimer Disease(AD). We plan to configure a Virtual Organization (VO), so thatauthorized users can share data and resources and implementthe following use cases: screening, tele-training and tele-diagnosisfor mammograms and lung CT scans; statistical diagnosis bycomparison of candidates to a distributed data-set of negativePET scans for the diagnosis of the Alzheimer Disease. A smallscaleprototype of the required GRID functionality was alreadyimplemented for the analysis of digitized mammograms.