Cohen-Adad, Julien

My lab is developing advanced Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) techniques for quantitative assessment of the brain and spinal cord structure. These developments include hardware (coils), MRI sequences (relaxometry, diffusion tensor imaging, magnetization transfer, functional MRI) and software (multimodal registration, segmentation, motion correction, distortion correction). There is a strong focus on translating research developments into clinics, aiming to improve the diagnosis and prognosis in patients suffering from neurological diseases and traumas.

The environment is highly multi-disciplinary. We interact with biomedical engineers, physicists, radiologists, neurologists and neurophysiologists. Plus, our lab collaborates with the Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at Harvard, therefore some projects will involve travelling to Boston. Projects include:

Developing methods for spinal cord MRI in multiple sclerosis (collaboration with Harvard),
Studying features of the brain using ultra-high field MRI (collaboration with Harvard),
Development of deep learning methods for analysis of medical images (collaboration with Mila),
Development of open source software for medical imaging applications,
Building of MRI antenna

Affiliation(s)

Tier-2 Canada Research Chair in Quantitative Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Chairholder
Functional Neuroimaging Unit (UNF), Co-director
Laboratoire de Recherche en Neuroimagerie (NeuroPoly), Co-director
Centre de recherche du CHU Sainte-Justine, Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada, Researcher
Centre de recherche de l'Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal (CRIUGM), Researcher
Department of Neurosciences, Université de Montréal, Adjunct Professor
Quebec Bio-Imaging Network (QBIN), Member
Advanced Research Centre in Microwaves and Space Electronics (POLY-GRAMES), Member
Institut de génie biomédical, Member
Institute for Data Valorization (IVADO), Member
Mila - Quebec AI Institute, Montreal, QC, Canada, Associate member

Expertise type(s) (NSERC subjects)

1900 BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING
1901 Biomedical technology
6400 LIFE SCIENCES RESEARCH RELATED TO HUMAN HEALTH AND DISEASE
9000 MEDICAL SCIENCES
2708 Image and video processing
2605 Pattern analysis and machine intelligence
2603 Computer vision
2705 Software and development
3115 Medical physics

Publications

Recent publications

Schilling, K. G., Grussu, F., Ianuş, A., Hansen, B. B., Howard, A., Barrett, R., Aggarwal, M., Michielse, S., Nasrallah, F. A., Syeda, W., Wang, N., Veraart, J., Roebroeck, A., Bagdasarian, A. F., Eichner, C., Sepehrband, F., Zimmermann, J., Soustelle, L., Bowman, C., ... Jelescu, I. (2025). Considerations and recommendations from the ISMRM diffusion study group for preclinical diffusion MRI: Part 2-Ex vivo imaging: Added value and acquisition. PubMed.

Schilling, K. G., Howard, A., Grussu, F., Ianuş, A., Hansen, B. B., Barrett, R., Aggarwal, M., Michielse, S., Nasrallah, F. A., Syeda, W., Wang, N., Veraart, J., Roebroeck, A., Bagdasarian, A. F., Eichner, C., Sepehrband, F., Zimmermann, J., Soustelle, L., Bowman, C., ... Jelescu, I. (2025). Considerations and recommendations from the ISMRM Diffusion Study Group for preclinical diffusion MRI: Part 3-Ex vivo imaging: Data processing, comparisons with microscopy, and tractography. Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, 22 pages.

Jelescu, I., Grussu, F., Ianuş, A., Hansen, B. B., Barrett, R., Aggarwal, M., Michielse, S., Nasrallah, F. A., Syeda, W., Wang, N., Veraart, J., Roebroeck, A., Bagdasarian, A. F., Eichner, C., Sepehrband, F., Zimmermann, J., Soustelle, L., Bowman, C., Tendler, B. C., ... Schilling, K. G. (2025). Considerations and recommendations from the ISMRM diffusion study group for preclinical diffusion MRI: Part 1: In vivo small-animal imaging. [Discussion or Letter]. Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, 28 pages.

Campbell, J. S. W., Baete, S. H., Cohen-Adad, J., Tournier, J.‐D., Szczepankiewicz, F., Beaulieu, C., Baron, C. A., Mani, M., Setsompop, K., Liao, C., Tardif, C., Vos, S. B., Yendiki, A., Leppert, I. R., Fieremans, E., de Luca, A., Leemans, A., & Pike, G. B. (2025). Diffusion MRI acquisition for tractography: Beyond the in vivo adult human brain. In Dell'Acqua, F., Descoteaux, M., & Leemans, A. (eds.), Handbook of Diffusion MR Tractography (pp. 143-149).

See all publications (491)

Biography

Prof. Cohen-Adad is an MR physicist and software developer with over 15 years of experience in advanced MRI methods for quantitative assessment of the brain and spinal cord structure and function. He is an associate professor at Polytechnique Montreal, adjunct professor of neuroscience at the University of Montreal, associate director of the Neuroimaging Functional Unit (Univ. Montreal), member of Mila (Univ. Montreal) and he holds the Canada Research Chair in Quantitative Magnetic Resonance Imaging. Along with his colleagues Prof. Nikola Stikov, Prof. Alonso-Ortiz and Prof. De Leener, he is co-directing the NeuroPoly Lab (www.neuro.polymtl.ca), which includes about 30 graduate students and research associates. Prof. Cohen-Adad's research is highly cited (Google Scholar). As a leader in the field, he organized multiple workshops at international conferences (https://spinalcordmri.org/workshops.html). He is a frequent guest lecturer on advanced MRI methods and he regularly serves as consultant for various companies (e.g. Biospective Inc., NeuroRx, IMEKA) and academic (Harvard, U. Toronto, UCL, UCSF, etc.) for setting up MRI acquisition and image processing protocols.

Do you want to join the lab? See: job opportunities

Teaching

GBM6125 : Bases du génie biomédical
GBM6904 : Séminaires de génie biomédical
GBM8378 : Principes d'imagerie biomédicale

Supervision at Polytechnique

COMPLETED

Ph.D. Thesis (6)
- Enguix Chiral, V. (2022). Neonatal Resting-State Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging: Optimization of Data Acquisition and Democratization of Data Preprocessing [Ph.D. thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Mangeat, G. (2021). Development of in-Vivo Histology with Quantitative Magnetic Resonance Imaging to Resolve Fine Neurodegenerative Features [Ph.D. thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Topfer, R. (2021). Local Coils and Prospective Shimming for MRI of the Spinal Cord [Ph.D. thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- De Leener, B. (2017). Development of an MRI Template and Analysis Pipeline for the Spinal Cord and Application in Patients with Spinal Cord Injury [Ph.D. thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Duval, T. (2017). Quantification de la microstructure de la moelle épinière humaine par IRM et application chez des patients avec sclérose en plaques [Ph.D. thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Lopez Rios, N. (2017). Development of a New Multi-Channel MRI Coil Optimized for Brain Studies in Human Neonates [Ph.D. thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
Master's Thesis (18)
- Bédard, S. (2024). Exploring the Impact of Anatomical References for Quantifying Spinal Cord Morphometrics Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Bourget, M.-H. (2022). Écosystème logiciel de segmentation de neurones sur des images microscopiques par apprentissage profond [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Cereza, G. (2022). Development of an Innovative Solution Minimizing RF Field Inhomogeneity and Energy Deposition in Ultra-High Field MRI Applications [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- D'Astous, A. (2022). Shimming Toolbox: An Open-Source Software Package for Shimming the B0 and B1 Field in Magnetic Resonance Imaging [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Lemay, A. (2022). Impact of Soft Segmentation Training on Medical Image Segmentation and Uncertainty Representation [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Vincent, O. (2021). Impact of Rater Style on Deep Learning Segmentation in Medical Imaging [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Rouhier, L. (2020). Prognosis for Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy: A Computer Learning Approach on the AOspine Database [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Nami, H. (2019). Clustering of the White Matter Tracts in the Rat Spinal Cord Based on Quantitative Histology [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Samuel Perone, C. (2019). Deep Learning Methods for MRI Spinal Cord Gray Matter Segmentation [Master's thesis, Polytechnique Montréal].
- Gros, C. (2018). Automatic Segmentation of Intramedullary Multiple Sclerosis Lesions [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Zaimi, A. (2018). Automatic Axon and Myelin Segmentation of Microscopy Images and Morphometrics Extraction [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Germain, G. (2017). Une antenne hybride RF/shimming pour l'IRM de la moelle épinière [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Saliani, A. (2017). Construction d'un atlas de la microstructure de la matière blanche de la moelle épinière chez le rat à partir d'acquisitions histologiques [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Vuong, M. T. (2017). Comparison of Myelin Imaging Techniques in Ex Vivo Spinal Cord [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Lévy, S. (2016). Caractérisation de la microstructure des voies spinales humaines par IRM multiparamétrique [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Mangeat, G. (2016). Study of Human Cortical Microstructure Using Magnetization Transfer and T2* Mapping with Application in Multiple Sclerosis [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- Foias, A. (2015). Design and Construction of a Highly Sensitive Coil for MRI of the Spinal Cord [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].
- De Leener, B. (2014). Segmentation automatique de la moelle épinière sur des images de résonance magnétique par propagation de modèles déformables [Master's thesis, École Polytechnique de Montréal].

News about Julien Cohen-Adad

NEWS | January 6, 2022

Québec Science Discovery of the Year: two Polytechnique Montréal professors among the top10 finalists | Read

BLOG | August 31, 2021

Giant leaps forward in spinal cord imaging | Read

NEWS | June 22, 2021

Canada Research Chairs Program: Chair renewal for Polytechnique Montréal's Professor Julien Cohen-Adad | Read

NEWS | February 24, 2021

50 Polytechnique Montréal researchers among the top 2% most cited in their respective fields | Read

Press review about Julien Cohen-Adad

January 23, 2022, Québec Science, Un nouveau protocole qui promet de changer le monde médical Une équipe de 92 personnes, menée par le Pr Julien Cohen-Adad du Département de génie électrique de Polytechnique Montréal, a mis au point un protocole permettant de créer des images par résonance magnétique de la moelle épinière plus claires et plus justes qu’auparavant.

January 1, 2022, Québec Science, Moelle épinière : nouveau souffle pour les IRM Jusqu’à tout récemment, les images de la moelle épinière obtenues par résonance magnétique n’étaient pas standardisées, ce qui empêchait de les comparer et de suivre l’évolution des lésions. C’est maintenant réglé grâce à une avancée du Pr Julien Cohen-Adad du Département de génie électrique sélectionnée parmi les 10 Découvertes de l’année par le magazine Québec Science.

February 8, 2016, Le Devoir, Les capacités d'apprentissage du système nerveux Image obtenue par résonance magnétique des faisceaux de fibres nerveuses (ou axones) qui descendent dans la moelle épinière et dont les corps cellulaires sont situés dans le cortex cérébral. ( Photo: Laboratoire du professeur Julien Cohen-Adad, École Polytechnique de Montréal).

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