Jiong Zhang

Professor
Laboratory of Advanced Theranostic Materials and Technology,
NIMTE, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Email: jiong.zhang(AT)ieee(DOT)org

[Recent News] - [Professional Activities] - [Open Positions] - [Highlighted Publications] - [Grants] - [ G o o g l e Scholar ]

I am Jiong Zhang. I am currently a professor at Laboratory of Advanced Theranostic Materials and Technology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). I have obtained my PhD degree from the IMAG/e group at Eindoven University of Technology (TU/e), Eindhoven, the Netherlands in 2017. Afterwards, I worked as a postdoctoral research associate at TU/e. From 2018 I moved to the US and continued my postdoctoral research at Laboratory of NeuroImaging (LONI) at Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California (USC), Los Angeles, USA. My research interests lies in developing advanced techniques, including artificial intelligence, geometric analysis, and shape analysis, for image enhancement, segmentation, and biomarker extraction. My work is particularly focused on advancing the understanding and analysis of vascular and small vessel diseases in brain, eyes, and other organs. In the last few years, I have published over 80 papers in leading medical imaging journals and conferences, including IEEE TPAMI, IEEE TMI, IEEE TIP, MedIA, IEEE TBME, PR, MICCAI and ISBI. I am currently serving as the Associate Editors of Pattern Recognition, IEEE JBHI and Medical Physics, and have been actively leading the Guest Editorship of several special issues in leading journals including IEEE Journal of Biomed. and Health Inform (Foundation Models in Medical Imaging), and academic services such as the Area Chair or PC member of several leading conferences including MICCAI, AAAI, CVPR, ICASSP, etc.. I am a senior member of IEEE.

My research focuses on:

Medical Image Processing: image enhancement, pathology segmentation/detection, image registration.

Vascular Analysis: retinal microvascular segmentation/analysis (2D/3D), neurovascular image analysis.

Shape Analysis: vascular/cortical surface reconstruction and analysis.

⚡Related Diseases: Cerebrovascular diseases, small vessel diseases, diabetic retinopathy/neuropathy (DR/DN), age-related macular degeneration (AMD), glaucoma, alzheimer's disease (AD), ischemic stroke, and moyamoya disease.

⚡Image Modalities: [Brain] MRI, MRA, CTA, DSA. [Eye] OCT, AS-OCT, OCTA, FA, Fundus, UWF, Confocal Microscopy (CM).

3D Shape Reconstruction and Analysis for OCT-Angiography

Scientist Position: We have several Postdoctoral Positions in AI for Medical Image Analysis available at CAS, Ningbo, China.

Research Assistant: We have several Research Assistant Positions in AI for Medical Image Analysis available at CAS, Ningbo, China. This position is opening for candidates with a bachelor/master degree.

Visiting PhD Student: We welcome PhD students from overseas universities to spend a minimum of one to a maximum of two years at CAS, Ningbo, China.

Recent News:

BMJOphth'26 [11/2025] Our [Guest Editorial: Integrating AI, imaging innovations and omics for precision medicine] has now been officailly published. It brings together 12 high-quality research papers and explores balancing AI’s benefits and oversight in ophthalmology, safeguarding patient identity in the era of rich data, and adapting the workforce to increasingly autonomous AI..
MedIA'26 [02/2026] One paper was accepted by MedIA: "Generative Data-engine Foundation Model for Universal Few-shot 2D Vascular Image Segmentation" has been accepted by Medical Image Analysis.
MedIA'26 [02/2026] One paper was accepted by MedIA: "Artifact-suppressed 3D Retinal Microvascular Segmentation via Multi-scale Topology Regulation" has been accepted by Medical Image Analysis.
XINN'26 [02/2026] One paper was accepted by The Innovation: "Prompt Mechanisms in Medical Imaging: A Comprehensive Survey" has been accepted by The Innovation.
MICCAI'26 [01/2026] I was invited to serve as an Area Chair for The 29th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention (MICCAI 2026) that will be held from October 4th to 8th 2026 in ANDEC Centre, Abu Dhabi - United Arab Emirates.
JBHI'25 [12/2025] I was invited to join the Editor Board of IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics (JBHI) and appointed as an Associate Editor.
JBHI'25 [11/2025] Our [Guest Editorial: Special Issue on Foundation Models in Medical Imaging] has now been officailly published. It brings together 21 high-quality research papers advancing theory, methodology, and applications of the latest developments and emerging trends in foundation models for medical imaging.
PR'25 [09/2025] One paper was accepted by Pattern Recognition: "MTD-Net: A Robust Multi-Task Discriminative Network for Choroidal Neovascularization Segmentation" has been accepted by Pattern Recognition.
MedIA'25 [09/2025] One paper was accepted by MedIA: "SurfGNN: A Robust Surface-Based Prediction Model with Interpretability for Coactivation Maps of Spatial and Cortical Features" has been accepted by Medical Image Analysis.
TPAMI'25 [08/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE TPAMI: "Neovascularization Segmentation via a Multilateral Interaction-Enhanced Graph Convolutional Network" has been accepted by IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence. Congratulations to my PhD student Tao Chen for the excellent work! 👏👏👏🎉🎉🎉
SWITCH'25 [06/2025] Welcome to submit your work to our [SWITCH2025]: Stroke Workshop on Imaging and Treatment CHallenges on MICCAI 2025 at Daejeon, Korea.
MICCAI'25 [06/2025] Two papers were accepted by MICCAI 2025 which will be held on September 23-27, 2025 in DAEJEON, Korea.
ICIMH'25 [05/2025] I was invited to serve as an Area Chair for the 6th International Conference on Intelligent Medicine and Health (ICIMH 2025) on November 14-16, 2025 in Kunming, China.
JBHI'25 [05/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE JBHI: "Fine-grained Hierarchical Progressive Modal-aware Network for Brain Tumor Segmentation"
BSPC'25 [04/2025] One paper was accepted by BSPC: "Automating Vessel Segmentation in the Heart and Brain: A Trend to Develop Multi-Modality and Label-Efficient Deep Learning Techniques"
ICGIP'25 [04/2025] I was invited to join the Technical Committee of ICGIP 2025 at Nanjing, China.
EMBC'25 [04/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE EMBC: "CMOS: Confidence-guided Multi-scale Semi-supervised Segmentation for Retinal Layers in OCT Images"
MICAD'25 [04/2025] I was invited to join the Program Committee of The 6th International Conference on Medical Imaging and Computer-Aided Diagnosis (MICAD 2025) at London, UK.
SWITCH'25 [04/2025] We are organizing the SWITCH2025: Stroke Workshop on Imaging and Treatment CHallenges on MICCAI 2025 at Daejeon, Korea.
PR'25 [03/2025] One paper was accepted by Pattern Recognition: "3D Microvascular Reconstruction in Retinal OCT Angiography Images via Domain-Adaptive Learning"
VSIP'25 [02/2025] I was invited to serve as an Area Chair for The 7th International Conference on Video, Signal and Image Processing (VSIP 2025) will be held in Kunming, China during November 14-16, 2025.
TMI'25 [02/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE TMI: "DSCA: A Digital Subtraction Angiography Sequence Dataset and Spatio-Temporal Model for Cerebral Artery Segmentation"
TMI'25 [01/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE TMI: "RSAPower: Random Style Augmentation Driven Structure Perception Network for Generalized Retinal OCT Fluid Segmentation"
MICCAI'25 [01/2025] I was invited to serve as an Area Chair for MICCAI 2025
ISBI'25 [01/2025] One paper was accepted by IEEE ISBI: "MSAPNet: Multi-Scale and Multi-Axial Perception Network for Retinal Layers and Lesion Segmentation"
TMI'25 [12/2024] I was awarded as the IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging (TMI) Distinguished Reviewer (Platinum Level) for contributions to IEEE-TMI.
JBHI'24 [09/2024] One paper was accepted by IEEE JBHI: "MR^2-Net: Retinal OCTA Image Stitching via Multi-Scale Representation Learning and Dynamic Location Guidance"
TIM'24 [08/2024] One paper was accepted by IEEE TIM: "Self-Guided Adversarial Network for Domain Adaptive Retinal Layer Segmentation".
PR'25 [06/2024] I have been invited to join the Editor Board of Pattern Recognition as an Associate Editor.
MICCAI'24 [06/2024] Four papers were accepted by MICCAI 2024.

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Professional Activities:

Memberships:
- IEEE Senior Member
- MICCAI Member
Assocaite Editors (AE):
- Pattern Recognition
- IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics
- Medical Physics
- BMJ Open Ophthalmology
Organizer (Guest AE) of Special Issues:
- IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, Special Issue on “Foundation Models in Medical Imaging”, 2023.
- Frontiers in Medicine, Special Issue on “Predictive and Diagnostic Approaches for Systemic Disorders Using Ocular Assessment”, 2020.
- Sensing and Imaging, Special Issue on “Deep Learning for Medical Image Reconstruction and Analysis”, 2020.
Organizer of International Workshops:
- MICCAI-SWITCH Workshop (2025) MICCAI-SWITCH+ Workshop (2026)
Area Chair/PC:
- MICCAI (2024, 2025), ICASSP (2024, 2025), ICIMH (2025), ICGIP (2024, 2025), AAAI (2022), MICAD (2025), MCVR (2023), VSIP (2021, 2024), MICCAI-OMIA (2017-2023), ICCCV (2022), CVPR-CVPM (2019-2023)

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Highlighted Publications:

[ G o o g l e Scholar ]

• Z. Li, J. Zhang*, Y. Zeng, J. Lin, D. Zhang, J. Zhang, D. Xu, H. Kim, B. Liu, M. Liu*. [LINK] SurfGNN: A Robust Surface-Based Prediction Model with Interpretability for Coactivation Maps of Spatial and Cortical Features. Medical Image Analysis, Volume 107, Part A, 103793, 2026.

• T. Chen, D. Zhang, D. Chen, H. Fu, K. Jin, S. Wang, L.D. Cohen, Y. Zhao, Q. Yi, J. Zhang*. [LINK] Neovascularization Segmentation via a Multilateral Interaction-Enhanced Graph Convolutional Network. IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, vol. 47, no. 12, pp. 11107-11123, Dec. 2025.
CNVSeg-Dataset

• C. Lu, J. Zhang, D. Zhang, L. Mou, J. Yuan, K. Xia, Z. Guo, J. Zhang*. [LINK] Fine-Grained Hierarchical Progressive Modal-Aware Network for Brain Tumor Segmentation. IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, 2025, doi: 10.1109/JBHI.2025.3572301.

• J. Zhang; Q. Xie; L. Mou; D. Zhang; D. Chen; C. Shan, Y. Zhao, R. Su, M. Guo. [LINK] DSCA: A Digital Subtraction Angiography Sequence Dataset and Spatio-Temporal Model for Cerebral Artery Segmentation. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, vol. 44, no. 6, pp. 2515-2527, 2025,
DSA-Segmentation-Dataset

• C. Lu, Z. Guo, D. Zhang, L. Mou, J. Yuan, S. Ma, D. Chen, Y. Zhao, K. Xia*, J. Zhang*. [LINK] RSAPower: Random Style Augmentation Driven Structure Perception Network for Generalized Retinal OCT Fluid Segmentation. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, vol. 44, no. 5, pp. 2353-2367, 2025.

• H. Mao, Y. Ma, D. Zhang, Y. Meng, S. Ma, Y. Qiao, H. Fu, C. Shan, D. Chen, Y. Zhao, J. Zhang*. [LINK] MR²-Net: Retinal OCTA Image Stitching via Multi-Scale Representation Learning and Dynamic Location Guidance. IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, 29(1), 482-494, 2025, doi: 10.1109/JBHI.2024.3467256.

• J. Zhang, C. Lu, R. Song, Y. Zheng, H. Hao, Y. Meng, Y. Zhao. [LINK] Self-Guided Adversarial Network for Domain Adaptive Retinal Layer Segmentation. IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement, 2024, 73:3527110.

• X. Xu, P. Yang, H. Wang, Z. Xiao, G. Xing, X. Zhang, W. Wang, F. Xu, J. Zhang*, J. Lei*. [LINK] AV-casNet: Fully Automatic Arteriole-Venule Segmentation and Differentiation in OCT Angiography. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, 42(2), 481-492, 2023, doi: 10.1109/TMI.2022.3214291.

• G. Xing, L. Chen, H. Wang, J. Zhang, D. Sun, F. Xu, J. Lei, and X. Xu. [LINK] Multi-scale pathological fluid segmentation in OCT with a novel curvature loss in convolutional neural network. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging2022, 41(6):1547-1559.

• H. Wang, Y. Zhou, J. Zhang, J. Lei, D. Sun, F. Xu, and X. Xu. " [LINK]Anomaly Segmentation in Retinal Images with Poisson-Blending Data Augmentation. Medical Image Analysis 81 (2022): 102534.

• H. Hao, C. Xu, Q. Yan, D. Zhang, J. Zhang*, Y. Liu*, Y. Zhao, Sparse-based Domain Adaptation Network for OCT-A Image Super-Resolution Reconstruction, IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics, 2022, 26(9): 4402-4413.

• M. Awais, X. Long, B. Yin, S. F. Abbasi, S. Akbarzadeh, C. Lu, X. Wang, L. Wang, J. Zhang, J. Dudink, W. Chen, A hybrid DCNN-SVM model for classifying neonatal sleep and wake states based on facial expressions in video, IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics 25 (5), 1441-1449, 2021

• A.H. Kashani, S. Asanad, J. Chen, M. Singer, J. Zhang, M. Sharifi, M. Khansari, F. Abdolahi, Y. Shi, A. Biffi, H. Chui, J. M Ringman, Past, present and future role of retinal imaging in neurodegenerative disease, Progress in Retinal and Eye Research, 100938, 2021

• J. Zhang, Y. Shi. ” [LINK]Personalized Matching and Analysis of Cortical Folding Patterns via Patch-Based Intrinsic Brain Mapping”. In MICCAI 2021, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 12907, 710-720, 2021

• Y. Zhao, J. Zhang*, E. Pereira, Y. Zheng, P. Su, J. Xie, Y. Zhao, Y. Shi, H. Qi, J. Liu, Y. Liu. ” Automated Tortuosity Analysis of Nerve Fibers in Corneal Confocal Microscopy”. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging. (2020) vol. 39(9), pp. 2725-2737.

• J. Zhang, Y. Qiao, M. Khansari, J.K. Gahm, M. Sharifi, A.H. Kashani and Y. Shi. ”3D Shape Modeling and Analysis of Retinal Microvasculature in OCT-Angiography Images”. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging. vol. 39 (5), pp. 1335–1346, 2020

• M.S. Sarabi, M. Khansari, J. Zhang, S.K. Lenhoff, J.K. Gahm, Y. Qiao, A. H. Kashani, and Y. Shi. "3D Retinal Vessel Density Mapping With OCT-Angiography." IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics. 24, no. 12 (2020): 3466-3479.

• Maz Khansari, Jiong Zhang, Yuchuan Qiao, Jin K. Gahm, Mona Sharifi, Amir H. Kashani and Yonggang Shi. “Automated Deformation-based Analysis of 3D Optical Coherence Tomography in Diabetic Retinopathy”. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging. vol. 39 (1), pp. 236–245, 2019

• J. Zhang, A.H. Kashani and Y. Shi. ”3D Surface-Based Geometric and Topological Quan- tification of Retinal Microvasculature in OCT-Angiography via Reeb Analysis”. In MICCAI 2019, , vol. 11764, pp. 57-65, Springer International Publishing, 2019

• Da Chen, Jiong Zhang*and Laurent Cohen. “Minimal Paths for Tubular Structure Segmentation with Coherence Penalty and Adaptive Anisotropy”. IEEE Transactions on Image Processing. vol. 28 (3), pp. 1271–1284, 2019

• Z. Li, F. Huang, J. Zhang et al. ”Multi-modal and multi-vendor retina image registration”. Biomedical Optics Express. vol. 9 (2), pp. 410–422, 2018

• Jiong Zhang, Erik Bekkers, Da Chen, Tos Berendschot, Jean Schouten, Josien Pluim, Yonggang Shi, Behdad Dashtbozorg and Bart ter Haar Romeny. ”Reconnection of interrupted curvilinear structures via cortically inspired completion for ophthalmologic images”. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering. vol. 65 (5), pp. 1151–1165, 2018

• B. Dashtbozorg, Jiong Zhang*, Fan Huang and Bart ter Haar Romeny. ”Retinal microaneurysms detection using local convergence index features”. IEEE Transactions on Image Processing. vol. 27 (7), pp. 3300–3315, 2018

• J. Zhang, Y. Chen, E. Bekkers, M. Wang, B. Dashtbozorg and B. ter Haar Romeny. ”Retinal vessel delineation using a brain-inspired wavelet transform and random forest”. Pattern Recognition. vol. 69 (2017), pp. 107–123, 2017

• S. Abbasi, J. Zhang, R. Duits and B. ter Haar Romeny. ”Retrieving challenging vessel connections in retinal images by line co-occurrence statistics”. Biological Cybernetics, vol. 111 (3), pp. 237–247, 2017

• Jiong Zhang, Behdad Dashtbozorg, Erik Bekkers, Josien Pluim, Remco Duits and Bart ter Haar Romeny. ”Robust retinal vessel segmentation via locally adaptive derivative frames in orientation scores”. IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging. vol. 35 (12), pp. 2631–2644, 2016

• B. ter Haar Romeny, E. Bekkers, J. Zhang et al. ”Brain-Inspired Algorithms for Retinal Image Analysis”. Machine Vision and Applications, pp. 1-19, 2016. DOI: 10.1007/s00138-016-0771-9

• J. Zhang, R. Duits, G. Sanguinetti, and B. ter Haar Romeny. ”Numerical approaches for linear left-invariant diffusions on SE(2), their comparison to exact solutions, and their applications in retinal imaging”. Numerical Mathematics: Theory, Methods and Applications (NM-TMA), vol. 9 (1), pp. 1-50, 2015

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