Research Activities:
Overview, Samples and Publications

Biography

• Studies of Applied and Technical Mathematics at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, Germany.
  
  

• Study Abroad Semester on Applied Mathematics at the Auckland University of Technology (AUT), Auckland, New Zealand.
  
  

• Diploma Thesis on “Simulation of Surgical Cutting of Soft Tissue using the Extended FEM (X-FEM)”, at the Institute for Anthropomatics (IFA, KIT) and the Institute for Applied and Numerical Mathematics 4 (IANM 4, KIT).
  
  

• PhD student in Prof. Dr. Vincent Heuveline's Work Group Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), at the Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (IWR), at the University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany.
  
  

• PhD project part of Collaborative Research Center “Cognition-guided Surgery” (DFG Sonderforschungsbereich SFB / TRR 125), with focus on functional modeling and simulation of physiological processes in the human body.
  
  

• Guest Researcher at the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies (HITS), Research Group "Data Mining & Uncertainty Quantification (DMQ)", with focus on data science and machine learning for medical engineering.
  
  

• PostDoc Researcher at the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), at the Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (IWR) at the University of Heidelberg as from 01/2017 on, working on Cognition-Guidance for Personalized Biomechanical Simulations in Cardiac Surgery Assistance (in cooperation with the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Heidelberg University Clinic).
  
  

• Product Owner, Data Scientist and Researcher in the context of the 'GHG Medical Brain' Project at the Gotthardt Healthgroup AG (GHG), with focus on Python-based prototype development using methods and technologies of knowledge management, ontology engineering, semantic data modeling, semantic reasoning, data analytics, data science and explainable AI in the field of medical applications.
  
  

• (Senior) Research Scientist for Automation and Analytics, in the context of Automation Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, and Industry4.0 projects at the German Corporate Research Center of ABB, with focus on Automation Technologies, Artificial Intelligence, Neuro-Symbolic AI, Machine Learning, Semantic Data Modeling, Data Analytics, Industry4.0, Digital Twins, and Simulation Interoperability.

Research interests and Application Fields

• Functional Modeling and Simulation (using PDEs, with space and time discretization, including discontinuities; (X-)FEM and time integration); Applications: dynamic biomechanical processes in the human body.
  
  

• Simulation Integration into Assistance Systems and Workflows; Application: biomechanical simulations in clinical treatment workflows and in surgery assistance systems.
  
  

• Uncertainty Quantification in order for reliable simulation results; Application: Cognition-Guided Surgery.
  
  

• Semantic Workflow Modeling; Application: Surgical simulation-based treatments for Cognition-Guided Surgery.
  
  

• Semantic Reasoning, Machine Cognition and Artificial Intelligence for data-driven, simulation-enhanced surgery assistance.
  
  

• Data Integration through innovative, sensitive Data Assimilation and Optimization approaches to couple experimental/real-life data with numerical simulations (in the loop); Application: Medical and Industrial Data Integration.
  
  

• Semantic Data Modeling, Data Science, Machine Learning and Ontology-based Decision Assistance; Application: Intelligent personalized surgery assistance as well as industrial analytics and Digital Twin technology.
  
  

• Explainable AI, Semantic Data Infrastructures and Ontology-based Software Architectures; Application: Medical reasoning assistance, Semantic Facilitation & Integration Layer (SemFIL) for P&AEng, transparent industrial data analytics, Digital Twins.
  
  

• Modern Software Architectures, Automation Engineering, Industry4.0, Simulation Interoperability and Digital Twins; Application: Industrial Automation, Electrification, Motion scenarios, through integration of OT, IT and ET data and computational models.
  
  

• Neuro-Symbolic AI, to combine the best of both worlds: structured knowledge representation, ontologies, and knowledge graphs as well as neural networks, statistical learning, and data analytics; Application: bringing together Large Language Models and Knowledge Graphs for Augmented Engineering.

Publications (Journals and Proceedings)

• Nicolai Schoch, Vincent Heuveline
  "Towards Cognition-Guided Patient-Specific FEM-based Cardiac Surgery Simulation"
  Chapter in Springer's LNCS Lecture Notes in Computer Science (DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-59448-4_12),
  Proceedings of the "Functional Imaging and Modeling of the Heart (FIMH) 2017", 2017.

  
  

• Lena Maier-Hein, Swaroop Vedula, Stefanie Speidel, Nassir Navab, Ron Kikinis, Adrian Park, Matthias Eisenmann, Hubertus Feussner, Germain Forestier, Stamatia Giannarou, Makoto Hashizume, Darko Katic, Hannes Kenngott, Michael Kranzfelder, Anand Malpani, Keno März, Thomas Neumuth, Nicolas Padoy, Carla Pugh, Nicolai Schoch, Danail Stoyanov, Russell Taylor, Martin Wagner, Gregory D. Hager and Pierre Jannin.
  "Surgical Data Science: Enabling next-generation surgery"
  Article in Nature Biomedical Engineering (DOI: 10.1038/s41551-017-0132-7), 2017.
  Preliminary versions published as Joint Workshop Paper (arXiv:1701.06482, 2017) of the Surgical Data Science International Workshop SDS 2016, 2016.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Stefanie Speidel, York Sure-Vetter, Vincent Heuveline
  "Towards Semantic Simulation for Patient-Specific Surgery Assistance"
  Online-Proceedings of the Surgical Data Science International Workshop SDS 2016, 2016.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Fabian Kißler, Markus Stoll, Sandy Engelhardt, Raffaele de Simone, Ivo Wolf, Rolf Bendl, Vincent Heuveline
  "Comprehensive patient-specific information preprocessing for cardiac surgery simulations"
  Published in the International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery (IJCARS), Special Issue: IPCAI2016, (DOI: 10.1007/s11548-016-1397-0), 2016.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Patrick Philipp, Tobias Weller, Sandy Engelhardt, Mykola Volovyk, Andreas Fetzer, Marco Nolden, Raffaele De Simone, Ivo Wolf, Maria Maleshkova, Achim Rettinger, Rudi Studer, and Vincent Heuveline
  "Cognitive tools pipeline for assistance of mitral valve surgery"
  Proceedings of "SPIE. Medical Imaging 2016: Image-Guided Procedures, Robotic Interventions and Modeling", 2016.

  
  

• Andreas Fetzer, Jasmin Metzger, Darko Katic, Keno Maerz, Martin Wagner, Patrick Philipp, Sandy Engelhardt, Tobias Weller, Sascha Zelzer, Alfred Michael Franz, Nicolai Schoch, Vincent Heuveline, Maria Maleshkova, Achim Rettinger, Stefanie Speidel, Ivo Wolf, Hannes Kenngott, Arianeb Mehrabi, Beat Mueller-Stich, Lena Maier-Hein, Hans-Peter Meinzer, and Marco Nolden
  "Towards an open-source semantic data infrastructure for integrating clinical and scientific data in cognition-guided surgery"
  Proceedings of "SPIE. Medical Imaging 2016: PACS and Imaging Informatics: Next Generation and Innovations", 2016.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Sandy Engelhardt, Raffaele de Simone, Ivo Wolf, Vincent Heuveline
  "High Performance Computing for Cognition-Guided Cardiac Surgery: Soft Tissue Simulation for Mitral Valve Reconstruction in Knowledge-based Surgery Assistance"
  Chapter in H.G. Bock et al. (eds.) Modeling, Simulation and Optimization of Complex Processes (DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-67168-0_17),
  Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on High-Performance Scientific Computing, 2015.

  
  

• Jonas Kratzke, Nicolai Schoch, Christian Weis, Matthias Mueller-Eschner, Stefanie Speidel, Mina Farag, Carsten Beller, and Vincent Heuveline
  "Enhancing 4D PC-MRI in an aortic phantom considering numerical simulations"
  Proceedings of "SPIE 9412, Medical Imaging 2015: Physics of Medical Imaging", 2015.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Sandy Engelhardt, Norbert Zimmermann, Stefanie Speidel, Raffaele De Simone, Ivo Wolf, and Vincent Heuveline
  "Integration of a biomechanical simulation for mitral valve reconstruction into a knowledge-based surgery assistance system"
  Proceedings of "SPIE 9415, Medical Imaging 2015: Image-Guided Procedures, Robotic Interventions and Modeling", 2015.

  
  

• Stefan Suwelack, Markus Stoll, Sebastian Schalck, Nicolai Schoch, Rüdiger Dillmann, Rolf Bendl, Vincent Heuveline, and Stefanie Speidel
  "The Medical Simulation Markup Language (MSML) – Simplifying the Biomechanical Modeling Workflow"
  Published in the Journal on Studies in Health Technology and Informatics, PMID:24732543, 2014.

  
  

Publications (Preprints and Others)

• Nicolai Schoch, Vincent Heuveline
  "Towards an Intelligent Framework for Personalized Simulation-enhanced Surgery Assistance: Linking a Simulation Ontology to a Reinforcement Learning Algorithm for Calibration of Numerical Simulations"
  Preprint Issue (No. 05/2017) of the Preprint Series of the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), 2017.

  
  

• Simon Gawlok, Philipp Gerstner, Saskia Haupt, Vincent Heuveline, Jonas Kratzke, Philipp Loesel, Katrin Mang, Mareike Schmidtobreick, Nicolai Schoch, Nils Schween, Jonathan Schwegler, Chen Song, Martin Wlotzka
  "HiFlow3 -- Technical Report on Release 2.0"
  Preprint Issue (No. 06/2017) of the Preprint Series of the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), 2017.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch
  "Towards Cognition-Guided Patient-Specific Numerical Simulation for Cardiac Surgery Assistance"
  PhD Thesis, published at the Heidelberg Document Server HeiDOK, (DOI: 10.11588/heidok.00022579), 2017.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Fabian Kißler, Markus Stoll, Sandy Engelhardt, Raffaele de Simone, Ivo Wolf, Rolf Bendl, Vincent Heuveline
  "Comprehensive Pre- and Post-Processing for Numerical Simulations in Cardiac Surgery Assistance"
  Preprint Issue (No. 02/2015) of the Preprint Series of the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), 2015.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Fabian Kissler
  "HiFlow3-Tutorial: Elasticity Simulation using HiFlow3"
  HiFlow3-Tutorial, for "HiFlow3", Documentation and Tutorials, 2014.

  
  

• Christoph Paulus, Stefan Suwelack, Nicolai Schoch, Stefanie Speidel, Rüdiger Dillmann and Vincent Heuveline
  "Simulation of Complex Cuts in Soft Tissue with the Extended Finite Element Method (X-FEM)"
  Preprint Issue (No. 02/2014) of the Preprint Series of the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), 2014.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Sandy Engelhardt, Norbert Zimmermann, Stefanie Speidel, Raffaele De Simone, Ivo Wolf, and Vincent Heuveline
  "Integration einer Biomechanischen Simulation zur Unterstützung von Mitralklappen-Rekonstruktionen in ein Wissensbasiertes Assistenzsysystem"
  Article in "Tagungsband der CURAC 2014", Deutsche Gesellschaft für Computer- und Roboterassistierte Chirurgie, e.V., 2014.

  
  

• Nicolai Schoch, Stefan Suwelack, Rüdiger Dillmann and Vincent Heuveline
  "Simulation of Surgical Cutting of Soft Tissue using the X-FEM"
  Preprint Issue (No. 04/2013) of the Preprint Series of the Engineering Mathematics and Computing Lab (EMCL), 2013.

  
  

Teasers

Illustration of the specifications of the contact elasticity problem formulation
made for describing the mitral valve behavior and the procedure of MVR annuloplasty surgery.

Results from two steps in the Cognitive Application Pipeline for Cardiac Surgery Assistance:
The patient-individual MVR model setup and the simulation visualization.

Evolution of medical data:
Based on the Cognitive Application Pipeline, the available medical patient data gets gradually enhanced and completed for MVR surgery assistance.

MVR simulation results:
Visualization of the virtual annuloplasty ring implantation process and the post-surgery MV behavior.

Cognitive Application Pipeline architecture for medical information processing.
Also illustrating the interaction with the semantic data infrastructure (see next picture)
and the utilization of miscellaneous compute server systems.

Schematic illustration of the central components of the Semantic System Architecture with focus on the underlying data infrastructure of the knowledge base,
which combines a flexible data storage (XNAT) with SemanticWeb Technologies and with standardized application interface.

Radial structure diagram visualization of the FEM Surgery Simulation Assistance Ontology.

Illustration of the overall system setup and its contained building blocks of
the intelligent Personalized Simulation-enhanced Surgery Assistance system prototype, i-PSSA.

Projects

• HiFlow³ – Multi-Purpose Finite Element Software, (Fields of responsibility: structural mechanics, elasticity simulation, module 'LA-Toolbox', MSML interface).
  
  

• Collaborative Research Center 'Cognition-guided Surgery' (SFB/TRR 125), (Field of responsibility: Project I03 'Functional modeling and numerical simulation').

Cognition-Guided Surgery (SFB/TRR 125).

• Medical Simulation Markup Language (MSML), (Fields of responsibility: clinical workflow representation, modeling and automation, integration of HiFlow³-based FEM simulations).
  
  

• Knowledge-based Surgery Assistance for Mitral Valve Reconstruction, (Fields of responsibility: integration of HiFlow³-based soft tissue simulation into surgery assistance, preprocessing workflow automation, cognitive surgical guidelines framework).
  
  

• 4D (MR-)Imaging for Enhancement of Diagnosis in Surgery and Radiotherapy, (Fields of responsibility: project conceptuation, cognition for FEM simulation, OR/simulation interface).

Talks and Presentations

• "Towards Cognition-Guided Patient-Specific FEM-Based Cardiac Surgery Simulation"
  @ "9th International Conference on 'Functional Imaging and Modeling of the Heart (FIMH) 2017", Sunnybrook Health Sciences Center, Toronto, ON, Canada, 11.06.2017.

  
  

• "Cognition-guidance for FEM simulation in surgery assistance"
  @ "HeKKSaGOn Working Group 'Seeds in Mathematics versus Needs outside Mathematics' 2017", Center for Mathematical Modeling and Data Science (MMDS), Osaka University, Osaka, Japan, 06.03.2017.

  
  

• "Towards cognition-guided patient-specific numerical simulation for cardiac surgery assistance" (Matching Presentation)
  @ "European Health Science Match 2016", Heidelberg, Germany, 26.09.2016.

  
  

• "Comprehensive patient-specific information preprocessing for cardiac surgery simulations"
  @ "Information Processing in Computer-Assisted Interventions IPCAI 2016", Heidelberg, Germany, 21./22.06.2016.

  
  

• "Towards Semantic Simulation for Patient-Specific Surgery Assistance"
  @ "Surgical Data Science SDS 2016", Heidelberg, Germany, 20.06.2016.

  
  

• "Cognitive tools pipeline for assistance of mitral valve surgery"
  @ "SPIE 2016 Medical Imaging Conference", San Diego, California, USA, 28.02.2016.

  
  

• "High-Performance Computing for Cognition-Guided Surgery, or How to integrate an HPC-based FEM soft tissue simulation for mitral valve reconstruction into a surgery assistance system?"
  @ "HPSC 2015 Conference", Hanoi, Vietnam, 17.03.2015.

  
  

• "Integration of a biomechanical simulation for mitral valve reconstruction into a knowledge-based surgery assistance system"
  @ "SPIE 2015 Medical Imaging Conference", Orlando, Florida, USA, 22.02.2015.

  
  

• "Integration einer Biomechanischen Simulation zur Unterstützung von Mitralklappen-Rekonstruktionen in ein Wissensbasiertes Assistenzsystem"
  @ "13. CURAC Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Computer- und Roboterassistierte Chirurgie e.V.", Munich, Germany, 13.09.2014.

  
  

• "Numerical Simulations for Cognition-Guided Surgery and the Challenges of Modeling Elastic Contact"
  @ "International SummerSchool on BioMechanics", Graz, Austria, 10.09.2014.

  
  

• "HiFlow3-based Numerical Simulations for Cognition-Guided Surgery"
  @ "PDE Soft 2014 Conference", Heidelberg, Germany, 15.07.2014.

  
  

• "HPC-based Numerical Simulations for Cognition-Guided Surgery"
  @ "International Symposium on Modeling and Simulation of the Cardiovascular System", Heidelberg, Germany, 11.02.2014.

  
  

• "HPC Methods in Medical Simulations - Functional Modeling and Simulation using HPC Methods"
  @ "International SummerSchool on HPC Challenges in Computational Sciences", New York City, New York, USA, 25.06.2013.

  
  

• "Medical Simulations - Mathematical Methods in Medical Technologies"
  @ "Science Vision Conference", Karlsruhe, Germany, 06.06.2013.
  See YouTube video "Mathe für die Leber" (in German).

  
  

Science Vision Conference, in Karlsruhe (Germany), on 06th of June in 2013.

Teaching

• Nonlinear Optimization (WS 2014 / 2015).
  
  

• Project-oriented Practical Programming Course / Advanced Practical Course (IFP): Efficient Elasticity Simulation using HiFlow3 (SS 2015).
  
  

• Proseminar: Einfuehrung in die Numerik (WS 2016/2017).

Workshops

• Participation in HLRS course: Iterative Linear Solvers and Parallelization, in Stuttgart, Germany, March 11-15, 2013.
  
  

• Participation in HLRS course: GPU Programming using CUDA, in Stuttgart, Germany, April 24-26, 2013.
  
  

• Participation in Materialise course: FEM-Simulation in Prosthetics, in Basel, Switzerland, November 26-27, 2013.