Chris Contag: In vivo optical imaging using bioluminescent reporters

Molecular imaging pioneer Christopher Contag, the founding director of a new biomedical research institute at Michigan State University (USA), was awarded the 2017 SPIE Britton Chance Biomedical Optics Award at SPIE Photonics West. The award recognizes Contag's contributions to the invention of in vivo optical imaging using bioluminescent reporters.

In this plenary session, Contag discusses making animal models transparent for scientific discovery.

Contag was named director of the new Institute for Quantitative Health Science and Engineering and chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering in the College of Engineering at Michigan State last year. He leads an interdisciplinary team of researchers whose goals are to build tools to understand complex biological processes and develop new therapies for cancer and other diseases.

He earned an undergraduate degree in biology and a PhD in microbiology at University of Minnesota (USA).