USC Directory Entry
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Manbir Singh
After receiving his Ph.D. in Nuclear Physics from the University
of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1971, Manbir Singh joined
the Laboratory of Nuclear Medicine and Radiation Biology at UCLA
as a postdoctoral scholar in Biomedical Imaging. While at UCLA,
Dr. Singh was a key member of an inter- disciplinary team which
designed and implemented the first 64-detector ring positron emission
tomography (PET) system. From these data derived from the PET system,
in vivo functional images are reconstructed using computed tomographic
techniques.
In 1976, Dr. Singh received a Visiting Scientist Award from the
American Heart Association to pursue research in nuclear medicine
and dynamic X-ray computed tomography for imaging the heart at the
Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Dr. Singh was a part of an
interdisciplinary team which developed the Dynamic Spatial Reconstructor
(DSR), a revolutionary CT scanner for three-dimensional imaging
and visualization of the beating heart. Dr. Singh pioneered the
use of single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) using
a rotating scintillation camera to detect and quantify acute myocardial
infarctions in three dimensions, and he was one of the first investigators
to demonstrate the synergism of X-ray CT and nuclear medicine SPECT
imaging in detecting and visualizing both anatomical and functional
aspects of the heart.
Dr. Singh joined the Medical Imaging Science Group within the
Department of Radiology at USC in 1977 and became an Associate Professor
in 1983. In 1987, he received a joint appointment as Associate Professor
of Biomedical Engineering, and in 1995, he became a Professor of
Radiology and Biomedical Engineering. His research interests have
spanned the general area of biomedical imaging, including development
of novel imaging instrumentation and techniques, image reconstruction
algorithms, radiation detectors, image processing for medical and
defense applications, neuromagnetic imaging, magnetic resonance
imaging (MRI) imaging, and NMR spectroscopy.
Dr. Singh proposed a new approach to nuclear medical imaging in
1977, based on electronically collimating emitted gamma rays using
a sequential interaction with a germanium detector and an uncollimated
scintillation camera. From 1980 to 1990, he received continuous
funding from the National Cancer Institute to develop a prototype.
He has also devised a new imaging modality, neuromagnetic imaging
(NMI), which could potentially provide images of cerebral processing
from a measurement of the magnetic field emitted by the brain during
functional activation. A superconducting quantum interference device
(SQUID) based neuromagnetometer is operational in Dr. Singh's laboratory
to record the neuromagnetic field evoked by different stimuli. In
collaboration with the Computer Science and Neurosurgery departments,
Dr. Singh received funding from a new Kaprielian Research Innovation
Fund established at USC to pursue this interdisciplinary research
from 1989 to 1993.
Dr. Singh has investigated the role of proton NMR spectroscopy
in localizing brain activation in humans and obtained the first
results showing a relationship between lactate and focal stimulation.
He is now developing new techniques in functional MRI to image human
brain function during various sensory and cognitive stimuli.
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