Profile

Education

• Ph.D., Texas A&M University, 1997
• M.S., DePaul University, 1991
• B.S., Sogang University, Seoul, Korea, 1985

Research Areas and Descriptors

• Medical Physics: Radiation oncology physics, Monte Carlo method, nanoparticle-aided radiation/thermal therapy, and nanoparticle-aided cancer molecular imaging.

Background

Dr. Cho began at Georgia Tech in Spring 2007 as an Associate Professor of Medical Physics. Prior, he was an Associate Professor at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas.

Dr. Cho is a certified medical physicist in therapeutic radiologic physics by the American Board of Radiology and a licensed medical physicist in the same specialty by the State of Texas. Before he came to Georgia Tech, he was a faculty medical physicist at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, having served as a clinical physicist, educator, and researcher. He was involved with numerous grant-funded activities as a principal investigator or a co-investigator. He served as a member of a number of national committees and has served as a referee for the most of scientific journals on medical physics and as a reviewer for major granting agencies.

Research

Over the years, Dr. Cho has performed seminal research on radiotherapy-related topics such as Ir-192 dosimetry, beta particle dosimetry, radiotherapy quality assurance (QA), Monte Carlo modeling of medical linear accelerators and brachytherapy sources, and the use of gold nanoparticles for radiation therapy. He continues to have a special interest in the application of the Monte Carlo method to solve the problems related with various radiation treatment modalities such as intensity modulated radiation therapy, image guided radiation therapy, proton therapy, and brachytherapy.

In recent years, his research effort has been devoted to the use of gold nanoparticles as dose enhancers for radiotherapy, heat generators for thermal therapy, and imaging agents during pre-clinical molecular imaging. These applications are based on the following properties of gold nanoparticles: Preferential accumulation of gold nanoparticles within the tumor through a phenomenon typically known as enhanced permeability and retention; increase in photoelectric absorption within the tumor loaded with gold nanoparticles as a result of high atomic number of gold when irradiated with x-rays; and heat emission from gold nanoparticles to the surrounding tissue as a result of photothermal effect. Some of the specific projects include the development of Gold Nanoparticle-Aided Radiation Therapy (GNRT) and Gold Nanoparticle-Aided Thermoradiotherapy (GNAT), both of which are being conducted in collaboration with the researchers at UTMDACC. These new cancer treatment modalities are expected to be more powerful but less toxic than conventional radiation/thermal therapy. In addition to his therapy-related research, Dr. Cho's research group at Georgia Tech is currently developing a bench-top x-ray fluorescence computed tomography (XFCT) device that may be used for molecular imaging of cancers and other diseases in conjunction with bioconjugated gold nanoparticles.

Dr. Cho's research program covers a wide spectrum of research topics ranging from traditional medical physics to nanotechnology. Also, it is built upon both experimental and computational approaches to maximize the synergy between them. Therefore, it will offer a unique research opportunity for the medical physics graduate students, in terms of selecting their research topic and methodology. Students may work on more futuristic topics that may possibly result in a paradigm shift in cancer therapy and detection. Students may also work on more practical topics that may help conventional radiation therapy more accurate and effective. In general, Dr. Cho's graduate students are expected to eventually become academic/clinical medical physicists at various settings, after the graduation and, if necessary, post-graduate clinical training in medical physics. Alternatively, some students may find an employment with the industry or government related with their research in medical physics.