5/4/26
Last week, I had another early call with Dr. Umer at 6:30 am to discuss our project proposal. We decided to pivot slightly to really build off of the CytoDiff paper and experimenting/employing a new model into the framework for extracting image features. We are focusing on training the model on latent space embeddings rather than the image space. We will be using the same dataset that CtyoDiff used, the Munich AML Morphology Dataset, but that may change as we continue developing the project. I have a lot to learn both technically and conceptually, but I'm hoping we can get the proposal accepted soon.
4/20/26
After an early 5 am Zoom call last week, I partnered with Dr. Rao Umer from the Institute of AI for Health (AIH) in Munich, Germany. I am technically also under the mentorship of Dr. Carsten Marr, the director of the institute, though Dr. Umer will be providing most of the guidance. As of now, we are working to design a research proposal to get approved by Dr. Marr so that we can begin our research. We are exploring different possibilities for the datasets we would like to look at, and we are leaning towards blood cell types. This work is meant to help with the diagnostics of cancer, so I'm very excited to be entering this field.