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Facilities

South Eveleigh Biomedical Building

Our headquarters, located in the vibrant South Eveleigh precinct are a stone’s throw from Redfern station. Our space comprises closed plan offices with multiple breakout spaces to foster both concentration and collaboration. Our headquarters are also home to:

  • Robust computing resources
  • Versatile laboratory/workshop space
  • Wet lab access
  • Hybrid seminar and workshop facilities

Workshop/Lab

  • 3D printing lab (see printers below)
  • Robotic arm (UR16e  UR3e)
  • Drill press
  • Soldering station
  • Hand tools
  • Power tools

Hybrid Theatre, Charles Perkins Centre

The Hybrid Theatre has a vast array of research and training capabilities across a range of medical disciplines, such as interventional cardiology, neurosurgery, cardiothoracic surgery, laparoscopic surgery, cancer treatment planning, and any field where visualizing devices or contrast is paramount.

Siemens Artis Pheno C-Arm

The first instrument of its type in Australia, the Artis Pheno offers exceptional CBCT imaging quality in a wide range of clinical cases. The robot-supported angiography system was developed for use in minimally invasive surgery, interventional radiology and interventional cardiology.

Additional equipment

  • Siemens SC2000 ACUSON
  • Image intensifier
  • IT monitoring equipment
  • Anaesthesia machine
  • Heart-lung machine
  • Robotic surgical systems

An all-in-one solution for interventional radiology and surgery and the first instrument of its type in Australia, the Artis Pheno at Sydney Imaging offers exceptional imaging quality in a wide range of clinical cases. It is designed to broaden clinical capabilities and expand patient access while combating patient infection. The robot-supported angiography system was developed for use in minimally invasive surgery, interventional radiology and interventional cardiology.

Nelune Comprehensive Cancer Centre

Image X has secured access to a dedicated research bunker at Nelune Comprehensive Cancer Centre. This dedicated suite, designed to mirror its neighbouring treatment bunkers, is specifically tailored for radiation therapy research,

  • Elekta Linear Accelerator with integrated cone beam CT imaging capable of producing capable of producing high energy x-ray and electron beams.
  • Patient Rotation System (PRS) designed to investigate fixed-gantry treatments for proton therapy or low cost radiation therapy systems.
  • Photon Counting Detector (PCD) which is able to see “in colour” across the x-ray spectrum, giving better contrast between different types of tissue.
  • Carbon Nanotube (CNT) source which can be digitally focussed to acquire 3D x-ray images far faster than mechanically moving conventional sources.
  • Wireless x-ray detector, which we can move to various positions to simulate acquiring x-ray images with novel system geometries.

Australian MRI-Linac

The Australian MRI-Linac is located within a specialised research bunker at Liverpool Hospital. The MRI system has been built from the ground-up specifically for experimental work, and as such it represents exceptional opportunities for research, free from the typical constraints of clinical MRI systems. It is the world-first split bore MRI-Linac. 

  • 1 Tesla split bore MRI-system
  • 6 MV x-ray source
  • Patient rotation system prototype

 

Phantoms

To facilitate our research, we use a range of off-the-shelf and custom-phantoms. Some notable examples include:

The CIRS Dynamic Cardiac Phantom simulates the realistic motion of an average human heart. It provides known, accurate and repeatable 3D motion of a solid heart model inside the tissue-equivalent thorax phantom. 

The CIRS Dynamic Thorax Phantom provides known, accurate and repeatable 3D target motion inside a tissue equivalent phantom for investigating and mnimising the impact of tumour motion in the lung. 

T-Rex is a life-size 3D-printed phantom based on a clinical CT scan of the thorax from a patient with lung cancer. It was assembled from bony structures printed in gypsum, lung structures consisting of airways, blood vessels >1 mm, and outer lung surface, three lung tumors printed in nylon, and soft tissues represented by silicone. 

The XCAT tool is a CT simulator based on the 4D extended cardiac-torso (XCAT) phantom, a whole-body computer model of human anatomy and physiology. The XCAT software is currently available for download from the Image-X GitHub and is on two Image-X workstations: Costa (Windows) and Goliath (Linux). 

 

Robotic systems

 

  • 2 commercially available robotic arms,
  • an acrylic phantom with embedded gold fiducial markers,
  • a custom base plate for secure mounting to treatment systems,
  • Image X developed control software that reproduces measured tumour motion traces.

3D printers

The Spineprint Lab at the South Eveleigh Biomedical Building houses a collection of 3D Printers used across different projects:

Stereolithography – FormLabs Form 2

Masked Stereolithography – Phrozen Sonic Mini Resin 3D-Printer

Fused Deposition Modelling –  LulzBot TAZ Workhorse