The Deacon Image Analysis Core, housed within the department of Radiology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, provides secure, reproducible and scalable image processing and quantitative analysis support for human and nonhuman primate research studies.

Core services include consultation on imaging endpoints, retrieval and research-compliant de-identification of clinical images from the PACS system, standardized data curation and quality control, execution of validated processing pipelines for grant-funded studies including pilots and multi-site projects.

We support different imaging modalities: MRI, PET, multimodal imaging etc. We have existing, fully automated pipelines for structural processing, lesion volumes, cerebral blood flow measures from Arterial Spin Labeling, DTI, DKI, fMRI preprocessing, ROI-based network analysis etc. We are continuously adding new processing toolkits to support investigators at Wake Forest University.

We’re in the process of implementing Flywheel, an AI powered imaging platform, for project management within a secure research environment with full provenance tracking, version-controlled workflows and scalable processing for cross-sectional and longitudinal cohorts.

Core Services

  • Clinical image retrieval & de-identification
  • Study consult and analysis planning
  • Data curation and QC
  • Safety reads and research support
  • Image processing workflows
  • Quantification and biomarker extraction
  • Custom method development

How it works

Step 1 – Request a pre-study consult

Send us a short intake form describing aims, modalities, sample size, timepoints and outputs. We will schedule a consult to align on endpoints, feasibility, and deliverables.

Step 2 – Secure intake and pilot QC

We will review a small subset of scans to confirm compatibility, define QC criteria, and finalize the processing plan.

Step 3 – Processing and iterative QC

We will run the pipeline at cohort scale with structured QC.

Step 4 – Delivery

We will provide you with:

  • Processed images (project defined format)
  • Derived measures (spreadsheets + data dictionaries)
  • QC reports and exclusions log
  • Pipeline summary for methods description

Contact Us

Please use the following links to request a pre-study consult or check out our current services and pricing. For any other questions, please reach out to Caresse Hightower at Richarlette.Hightower@advocatehealth.org.