Dr. John Boone Named AAPM 2019 Gold Medal Recipient
UC Davis breast imaging scientist John Boone is the recipient of the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) 2019 William D. Coolidge Gold Medal. This award is presented to an AAPM member for an eminent career in medical physics and is the highest honor given by the organization. Boone will receive the award July 15 during the AAPM’s 61st Annual Meeting and Technical Exhibits in San Antonio, Texas.
“I nominated Dr. Boone based on my knowledge of his career in medical physics and the outstanding accomplishments in research, education and leadership on the local, national, and international stage in diagnostic radiology,” said Tony Seibert, Boone’s long-time friend, collaborator and colleague. “He is a very deserving individual who represents the essence of this award.”
Boone is a professor in the Department of Radiology at UC Davis Health and a professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at UC Davis. He studies X-ray system design, radiation dose, image analysis techniques, and for the past 20 years he has led the design, fabrication and testing of breast imaging systems using cone beam computed tomography (CT). The Boone lab has developed four breast CT scanners that have acquired more than 1,000 breast CT image data sets. His research group was the first to use cone beam dedicated breast CT in humans, and in collaboration with UC Davis colleagues Simon Cherry and Ramsey Badawi, integrated positron-emission tomography (PET) imaging into two of the four scanners.
Boone has authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers, served in several leadership roles including as president of the AAPM in 2015 and board chair in 2016. He is a fellow of five scientific organizations in his field and has received more than $20 million in competitive grant support from the National Institutes of Health.
As a leader in the UC Davis Department of Radiology since 1992, Boone has served as coordinator of the radiology residency education program in medical physics, vice chair of research and is currently chief of medical physics. He has mentored and supervised 24 graduate students and co-authored The Essential Physics of Medical Imaging (Bushberg, Seibert, Leidholdt and Boone), the leading textbook for radiology residents.
“There was a job opening in medical physics research and John landed it, which was lucky for the department and for UC Davis,” said Seibert, a professor in the Department of Radiology. “He immediately provided great leadership in educational and research programs.”
AAPM is a scientific and professional organization, founded in 1958, with a primary goal of identifying and implementing improvements in patient safety for medical use of radiation in imaging and radiation therapy.
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