DermaSense: 2020 Best Paper Award Research Project with the collaboration of ACT Computer Science Department
The collaborative project DermaSense by the Computer Science Department at ACT, the Medical Physics Lab at the AUTH Medical School, and the 2nd Dermatology Clinic of the Papageorgiou Hospital received the Best Paper Award at the 5th International Workshop for Microsystems on 15/12/2021.
The distinction was awarded during the one-day online conference organized by the Industrial Engineering and Management Department of the International Hellenic University.
DermaSense is a novel electrical impedance spectroscopy scanner featuring statistical and machine learning classification to support the medical diagnosis of early-stage melanoma cancer. The research team designed, built, and tested biomedical engineering hardware and software, as well as mathematical and AI algorithms, to provide early warning for different forms of skin cancer using Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy.
The project was developed by Sotiria Gilou from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and the ACT Research and Development team consisted of Christos Dimitrousis, Alexandros Zogkas, Prof. Panos Bamidis, and Assistant Professor in Computer Science Dr. Alexandros Astaras who steers the project.
Furthermore, the team has successfully obtained 171 sets of measurements from 25 human subjects, mainly on clear patches of skin, suspected malignant nevi, and 5 measurements on verified melanoma cases. Based on the measurements of clear patches of skin and suspicious melanoma, the ACT team has developed an Artificial Neural Network that performs a binary classification (clear patch of skin vs nevi) which at this point in development has demonstrated 77.4% accuracy, 94.7% sensitivity, 50% specificity and an F1 score of 83.7%, based on an initial pilot study dataset.
The project used Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning algorithms developed by ACT Computer Science graduate Christos Dimitrousis under the supervision of Dr. Alexander Astaras.
Congratulations to the DermaSense research and development team, many thanks for their contribution to Professor Siountas and Dr. Papanastasiou from the Medical Physics Laboratory (Medical School, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki) who supervise Ms. Gilou on her Ph.D. project, the Computer Science Department at the American College of Thessaloniki, as well as Dermatologists Prof. Betty Lazaridou, Dr. Valantis Korfitis and Dr. Christina Kemanetzi who support the development of the DermaSense system with clinical data and testing at the 2nd Dermatology Clinic of the Papageorgiou Hospital of Thessaloniki.
