Nuclear Science Symposium, Medical Imaging Conference, and Symposium on Room-Temperature Semiconductor X-Ray and Gamma-Ray Detectors

Dear Colleagues,

The 2023 IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium (NSS) and Medical Imaging Conference (MIC) together with the Symposium on Room-Temperature Semiconductor X-ray and Gamma-ray Detectors (RTSD) will be held at the Vancouver Convention Center, Vancouver, B.C from November 4^th  to 11^th. This conference is the premier meeting on the use of instrumentation in the Nuclear and Medical fields. World experts in the fields of nuclear science, radiation instrumentation, software engineering and data acquisition gather during the NSS. The MIC has its primary focus on the state-of-the-art use of physics, engineering, and mathematics in nuclear medicine and increasingly so in multi-modality and hybrid imaging including CT and MRI. The RTSD is a good complement to both the NSS and MIC segments of the conference as it impacts both interest areas with its focus on compound semiconductor radiation detectors. 

Many fundamental discoveries have been catalyzed by the unique synergistic and interdisciplinary aspect of this conference; collectively the three main areas span topics from instrumentation development to its use in bettering human health and advancing basic physics knowledge. Coordination among sessions of the three main areas has been carefully planned, and several joint sessions will feature papers that are of most relevance to all the communities. This will further foster cross-fertilization between different areas of expertise, which increasinlgy reflects the trends and needs of state-of-the-art research and maximizes its present and future impact on a broader societal level.

In order to stress the innovative and forward-looking aspects of the conference, this year we are planning a new joint session featuring the theme: ‘Future directions: from roadmaps to standards.’ We are selecting three ‘visionary’ speakers who will present their views on the opportunities and needs facing our fields of expertise in the context of the rapidly evolving technology and its impact on society. The session, which will include a round-table discussion,  will be mediated by senior IEEE academic and industry experts, thus providing the event with an even broader framework. This, hopefully vibrant and thought-provoking session, will be held on Tuesday afternoon, just before the exhibitor reception, where there will be opportunities for further networking. A large area has been reserved for the exibitors to have ample space for mingling and discussions from Tuesday, Nov 7^th to Thursday, Nov 9^th. Exhibitors have always been a very important aspect of our meeting  – not only from the commercial point of view, but also as catalyzers of exchange between Academia and the commercial world with ultimate benefits to both.  At the time of writing, 57 booths have already been sold and we are expecting more. 

As customary, the NSS sessions will run from Monday morning until Friday noon and the MIC sessions will be held from Tuesday noon until Saturday noon. RTSD sessions will run from Monday morning until Thursday afternoon; the complete schedule will be on the web and app in August. 

We will be featuring eight short courses and four workshops. The short courses were designed to ensure coverage of more fundamental and novel topics: Real-time machine learning on FPGAs; Fast timing detectors and readout; Integrated circuits for detector signal processing and radiation hardened design; Basics of radiation detection; Medical image reconstruction: from foundations to AI; PET kinetic modeling and parametric imaging; GATE, a Monte Carlo simulation platform for imaging and therapy;  Artificial intelligence in nuclear medicine image analysis and processing. The themes of the workshops were selected based on current resarch needs and by identifying research efforts that have a high chance to evolve into major research areas in the very near future:  The Digital SiPM Revolution: Opportunities, New Detector Concepts and Networking (SPAD); Open Kinetic Modeling Initiative; Young Investigators’ Workshop (YIWS); and Ultra-low-dose PET Imaging. 

A new feature this year was the request for a copyright form at the time of abstract submission. This will enable early publication of the submitted Abstracts in IEEE Xplore, which will serve as a record of the conference proceedings. This was done to ensure a timely dissemination of the general conference content and proof of presentation, while minimizing potential concerns about scientific publication duplication as a consequence of the brevity of the abstracts. 

The scientific part of the meeting will be complemented by the social events, including Women in Engineering (WIE) and Young Professionals (YP) events. We will have exceptional plenary speakers who were selected observing our society adherence to the IEEE WIE pledge (‘IEEE WIE pledges to work towards gender-diversified panels at all IEEE meetings, conferences, and events, including our own’): Jae Sung Lee, Sabrina Nagel and Katherine Pachal for NSS; François Bénard and Anca Constantin for MIC; Paul Sellin for RTSD and Dava Sobel for WIE. 

Student participation in this meeting is of fundamental, mutually beneficial importance: students learn from senior mentors, while ensuring continued leadership in the field. One hundred fifty (150) Trainee Travel grants have been made available to students to facilitate participation. We are encouraging them to take special advantage of the forward-looking session of the conference, and of the networking events availble through the YP, WIE and workshop sessions. Several awards (for a full list please refer to the conference website) will be presented at this meeting; this will give the opportunity to honor those individuals in our community who have or are expected to contribute significantly to bringing our collective field forward with new ideas and achievements. 

Following last year’s success, livestreaming of the Plenary Session will be open to anyone so that  any interested individual will be able to enjoy the opening of the 2023 meeting. The rest of the meeting, including short courses, will also be livestreamed via Live Stream, but available only to registered participants.  The recorded sessions will be made available to registered participants until December 2023. All poster presenters will upload their posters into the system, with a corresponding video, which will also be available later to registered participants. This year we will be able to host virtual oral presentations via Zoom in case a presenter may not be able to travel to Vancouver for emergency reasons.

And of course, it is also very important to enjoy our time together to relax and to brainstorm (some of the best ideas have been generated while sharing a meal). The venues for the social events have been chosen: the RTSD luncheon will be held in the Pinnacle, a revolving top floor restaurant with 360^o views of the city and the mountains (and we’ll keep our fingers crossed for blue skies). The NSS dinner will take place at the Science World, while the MIC dinner attendees will be able to explore different varieties of marine inhabitants while enjoying their food in the Vancouver Aquarium.

Travel information and much more detailed information is available on the conference webpage. We encourage you to check it on a regular basis for updates. The committee has been working hard to ensure a vibrant and forward-looking meeting with an outstanding scientific program. 

On behalf of the entire organizing committee I am very much looking forward to seeing you in Vancouver.

Vesna Sossi, General Chair, can be reached by E-mail at [email protected] or by phone at  +1 604 822 7710.