Hai Sun

I am currently an MD-PhD candidate with Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Medical School.

Born and raised in China, I came to the United States in 1994 and enrolled in the Great Books Program at St. John's College. I graduated with a BA in Philosophy and History in 1998.

Research

My PhD work is in the field of image-guided neurosurgery. The goal of the image-guided neurosurgery is to improve the safety and effectiveness of neurosurgical procedures by using medical images to help the surgeon navigate. Magnetic resonance (MR) images, the most common modality employed for this purpose, provides a detailed 3-D description of patient anatomy. These pre-operative images serve as the surgical "map" after the establishment of a correspondence between the image volume and the patient in the operating room. In other words, the position of a surgical target (e.g., a tumor), clearly visible in the MR images, can be more easily visualized by the surgeon. Furthermore, the brain undergoes soft tissue deformation during the surgery, which compromises the accuracy of the original "map", the pre-operative images. The conventional neuro-navigational systems based solely on pre-preoperative images face the challenge posed by the brain deformation.

We have developed a system that allows for the real-time overlay of pre-operative MR or CT imagery onto a surgeon's operating microscope view. Plus, utitlizing the binocular optics of the operating microscope, we have estimated the brain surface motion. This intra-operative information can be used to aid the prediction of the subsurface brain deformation by a mathematical model based on the finite element method and biomechanical properties of brain tissue. Finally, the pre-operative MR volume can be updated during the surgery. To learn more about the research, click here.

Details/Images/presentations/recent results/People/Publications

Other Interests

Cross Cultrual Education and Service Program
I participated in a service project organized by Dartmouth College. Thirty-six members, including students, faculty, physicians and staff members, from Dartmouth, were in Nicaragua between Dec. 11 and Dec. 23 in 2002. Our work consisted of construction and farming, setting up and running a medical clinic.
CCESP/Members

Dartmouth International Health Group

I have received a fellowship from Dartmouth International Health Group (DIHG) for the summer of 2003. I plan to travel to Sioma, Zambia to conduct epidemiology studies on a rare form of pediatric bladder stone.

I enjoy reading, travelling, outdoor sports, and woodworking.