February 23
@
11:00 AM
–
12:00 PM
In radiotherapy, time-dependent uncertainties can degrade deterministic treatments and lead to suboptimal outcomes for the patient. Ultimately, this can cause over- or under-treatment, leading to dysfunctional organs from excessive radiation exposure or tumor metastasis from poor coverage and a failed treatment. Managing time-dependent uncertainties in radiotherapy is crucial towards the success of the treatment and improving the patient’s quality of life. In this talk, we will explore methods from the area of optimization under uncertainty that can account for uncertain radioresistance that is often caused by tumor hypoxia. While standard (naïve-)robust treatment planning can overcome this, it can also produce overly conservative or suboptimal decisions, especially when there are changes during the treatment as often caused by reoxygenation of hypoxic cells. To overcome this, an adaptive framework is proposed that can adapt to updated information during the treatment. Using this framework, we will explore the value of multiple diagnostics to update the treatment and derive optimal intervention policies that account for time-dependent uncertainties in radiotherapy. Finally, we will conclude with a discussion on ongoing projects, including accounting for uncertainties from artificial intelligence-assisted radiotherapy.
Bio: Arka Roy is an Assistant Professor in the Management Science and Statistics department housed in the Alvarez College of Business at UTSA. He is also a Core Faculty member of the School of Data Science at UTSA. He received his Ph.D. from the School of Industrial Engineering at Purdue University, and he conducted research as a Visiting Research Fellow in the Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences department at Northwestern University.
His research focuses on the use of optimization under uncertainty and data analytics to improve end-user outcomes in the areas of healthcare and infrastructure services. He closely collaborates with clinicians and engineers to ensure that the research contributions are implementable in practice. His research, teaching, and service contributions have been recognized by various awards, including Best Paper Award by the IISE Transactions on Healthcare Systems Engineering journal, Endowed 1969 Commemorative Teaching Excellence Award at UTSA Alvarez College of Business, and Meritorious Reviewer Award by the INFORMS Journal on Computing.