Deformable Models and Medical Image Analysis 
				   
			 Demetri Terzopoulos
			 New York University
	      Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences

The modeling of biological structures and the model-based
interpretation of medical images evokes many challenging problems. I
will discuss a powerful paradigm, known as deformable models, which
combines geometry, computational physics, and estimation theory.
Deformable models evolve in response to simulated forces as dictated
by the continuum mechanical principles of flexible materials,
expressed mathematically through variational principles and PDEs. The
presentation will focus on several biomedical applications, including
image segmentation using dynamic finite element and topologically
adaptive deformable models, as well as recent work on "deformable
organisms" which aims to more fully automate the segmentation process
by augmenting deformable models with behavioral and cognitive control
mechanisms. I will also discuss the recent trend towards functional
modeling, such as craniofacial models that include the biomechanical
modeling of deformable facial tissues with embedded muscles of facial
expression.