Our Brand Manager Colleen Coll spreads the word about our company’s mission to cure cancer, one color palette at a time. Thank you Indiana University of Pennsylvania Alumni Magazine for your support.
“Thank you Quantitative Imaging Systems (Qi), KDAB and nanoQuill for this wonderful opportunity. nanoQuill app coming soon!,” said Colleen.
After much success of merging computer graphics and software with microscopy, it’s not surprising to find Qi’s next step into the future of cancer research…Virtual Reality (VR) (duh!)
Naturally, our first act toward this high level and carefully planned enterprise would be the sole responsibility of Qi’s very first intern.
Meet Milo Szecket!
Qi’s VR Experience internship was created to provide a more immersive experience in analyzing tissue. We believe biologists can see more within a VR system than just looking at one screen. Milo was the perfect candidate that fit the youth, talent, and intelligence we were looking for to start this project.
Although originally from California, he would spend most of his childhood living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the rest of his high school education currently at Governor Thomas Johnson High School in Frederick, Maryland, as a senior.
…So, Milo, what’s your story?
Well, I’ve always been interested in my dad’s work as a computer graphics designer and when an opportunity arose for me to participate in it while still sort of “doing my own thing,” I took it.
Tell us about yourself and why the interest in VR?
The obvious answer is because VR is COOL! But more than that, I haven’t seen many tools being created in VR, except specific-to-VR stuff like vector field makers.
The closest to a full program meant to actually do something in VR I have found is Kanova, a sculpting program that Foundry (a leading developer of software for media entertainment and digital design) is testing that looks really great. I think VR has a lot more applications to explore, and Qi’s VR Experience of interacting with the cells inside cancer tissue is certainly an interesting one that I’m excited to be a part of.
What’s the last thing you really geeked out about?
To be honest, it would have to be either this or the my robotics team. We are FRC Team 686, if you’re interested. I do data collection and analysis during competitions.
What motivated you to choose QiTissue as your first VR experience?
It’s really the only chance I’ve had to work with VR, plus, come on. Photoshop for curing cancer? How cool is that?!
What would you like to accomplish on this project?
Ideally (and obviously) I want to end up with a usable VR interface for all aspects of QiTissue, even the 2D ones. More realistically, I’ll be learning Unity VR development for a while before we get to that.
What are your wins so far?
Well, I got Unity installed and running on the Vive, which was more of a feat than I’d like to admit. At this point, the furthest I’ve gotten is being able to pick up a specimen and turn it around and look at it. Currently, it’s still mostly setup, but I’ll be doing more very soon.
What are the challenges so far?
The first thing I wanted to accomplish is grabbing the specimen with both hands and resizing it. This has proven to be a bit of a pain, and by a bit of a pain, I mean no one that I can find has done it with the newest VR plugins for Unity. That will be the main challenge, I think. Unbelievable the lack of documentation for such a new technology.
Milo’s goals for Qi’s VR Experience will be to create a novel experience so people will like it and a new interactive and natural way to navigate a 3D landscape as opposed to a mouse, trackpad, or joystick.
Milo’s work will be the benchmark for our future endeavors to perfect this project. Look for more posts about his progress on Qi social media!
Our partners KDAB and Qt once again featured nanoQuill and QiTissue at a special event! KDAB and The Qt Company created another nanoQuill Coloring Wall at Embedded World 2019 in Nuremberg, one of the worlds largest trade fairs for experiencing the whole world of embedded systems. With more than 1,100 exhibitors, experts, and numerous speakers from 52 countries, this year #EW2019 addresses the issue of embedded intelligence.
The performance of processors and integrated circuits has improved so much and they have become so inexpensive that new technologies like machine learning and artificial intelligence are finding their way into an increasing number of applications. Because this opens up the possibility of totally new systems that perceive their environment autonomously, draw conclusions from it and then make decisions, it made sense to feature nanoQuill and QiTissue and their workflow and machine learning aspects that advance cancer research and accelerate our fight to end the disease.
Thank you to our partners and fellow cancer warriors, KDAB and Qt! #color4cancer #fightcancerwithart #fightcancerwithprogramming #fightcanderwithsoftware #softwarewillendcancer
Vernissage! The grand opening of Cellulacrum! L’arte imita la scienza in Bologna with Cellulacrum: Sacred Inner Landscapes exhibit and special presentation by Italian artist Elena Uliana, Qi’s Michel Nederlof and journalist Nicoletta Gandolfi.
This special 3-week exhibit brought hundreds of art lovers to view and awe the works of Uliana and Nederlof: Art imitating science.
This marriage of art and science materialized via a chance encounter in Berlin. Nederlof and Uliana met near a river bank where they discussed common aspects of their work: he goes deep into human tissues annotating cells with fluorescences while she goes deep into the human soul “surpassing those doors which separate the surface world.”
The Cellulacrum project displays images of human cells and tissues magnified under the microscope which show that there is a real world beyond the surface. “They want to communicate that there are real ‘landscapes’ of the soul, the inner landscapes of the exhibition’s title, similar in complexity to the environment that surrounds us, but very difficult to penetrate. To go beyond the surface, also suggested by the physicality of human cells reproduced on the canvas, it is enough to learn to listen, to want to know oneself better,” said Uliana.
Uliana and Nederlof are currently seeking opportunities to bring Cellulacrum to the U.S. and other countries.
What happens when art imitates tech?
It becomes the birth of Cellulacrum: Sacred Inner Landscapes, a step-by-step journey inside the human body. This visually stimulating exhibition opens on September 3 – 18 in Bologna, Italy at the Dueunodue Spazi Espositivi gallery presented by Italian singular artist, Elena Uliana and Qi’s CEO Michel Nederlof.
The exhibition presents Uliana’s latest works from her artigiano hub Artenima that she describes as a “prolific comparison” of her latest works and Nederlof’s profound history of studying cells to benefit the advancement of cancer research.
Uliana’s style uses a mixed technique of acrylics, airbrush, fluorescent and phosphorescent colors which compliments Qi’s use of the microscope to analyze human tissues and cells, to better observe their development and behavior.
As she described in an interview with Luca Sperandio, “Cellulacrum is a reference to the microcosm of cells that hide behind the appearance of the visible. Unlike the paintings I made in the past, the paintings in this series have two fundamental novelties, namely the wide use of stones and minerals on the pictorial surface, These become strong material, with a visual appeal to the enlarged cells under the microscope. This is a trait d’union with the work of the physicist Michel Nederlof.”
What is the connection between our cells (cell) and our spiritual part (sacrum)? And what’s the connection between Elena Uliana and Michel Nederlof scientific research? How do science and art represent the Sacred?
This marriage of art and science materialized via a chance encounter in Berlin. Nederlof and Uliana met near a river bank where they discussed common aspects of their work: he goes deep into human tissues annotating cells with fluorescences while she goes deep into the human soul “surpassing those doors which separate the surface world.”
The Cellulacrum project displays images of human cells and tissues magnified under the microscope which show that there is a real world beyond the surface. “They want to communicate that there are real ‘landscapes’ of the soul, the inner landscapes of the exhibition’s title, similar in complexity to the environment that surrounds us, but very difficult to penetrate. To go beyond the surface, also suggested by the physicality of human cells reproduced on the canvas, it is enough to learn to listen, to want to know oneself better,” said Uliana.
Nederlof adds, “I use fluorescence colors to paint your cells. Elena uses fluorescence colors to paint your soul. The dialog between our works is a dialogue of body and soul. We know the soul is rooted in our cells, because we are built from cells. But we cannot place it or connect it. We are missing a dimension, so we struggle to connect the dots. By evoking the emotional response to her art, we can view deeper into our emotional being.
“Our ‘soul’, if you like to call it that, but I prefer a more comprehensive collection of elements that we cannot see or chemically equate. We can help find the dots that are weaving the patterns in our thoughts and by visualizing our microscopic building blocks of life, our cells, we can view the same being from the ground up. Seeing the complex structures they build and observing their interactions, we can build an understanding of the dots that create the pattern of our physical presence. The magic happens when we can connect all the dots,” declared Nederlof.
Born in Vittorio Veneto in July 1985, Uliana graduated in Literature with a thesis in Latin Literature on the theme of the initiatory path through the last book of Apuleio’s Metamorphoses at the Milan State University and subsequently she graduated in History of Art at the Ca’Foscari University of Venice.
After having had extensive life experiences, she learned to expose herself in the works she realizes by making full use of her remarkable technical skills learned through years of practice and study.
Quantitative Imaging Systems (Qi) in partnership with The KDAB Company, The Qt Company, and OHSU Knight Cancer Institute INTRODUCE nanoQuill: The Coloring Book of Life, a crowdsourcing coloring book and app that advances cancer research that advances cancer research. http://bit.ly/2kSMI8O
#color4cancer and post your artwork! 
Available on Amazon.com and www.nanoquill.org.
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