Francis Xiatian Zhang, PhD
I am currently a Research Associate at the University of Edinburgh. I obtained my PhD in Computer Science from Durham University (Supervisors: Prof. Hubert P. H. Shum and Dr. Noura Al Moubayed). My research focuses on integrating Geometric Information into computer vision applications, particularly in the analysis of Biomedical Engineering videos. Prior to this, I received my MRes degree from King's College London, my MSc degree from the University of Southampton, and my Bachelor's degree from Beijing University of Chinese Medicine.
Email / University Profile / Google Scholar / Linkedin / Twitter
News
- 5/2025: Our recent work BREA-Depth: Bronchoscopy Realistic Airway-geometric Depth Estimation has been early accepted by MICCAI 2025.
- 5/2025: I officially received approval for my PhD thesis—finally a formal PhD now!
- 1/2025: I passed my PhD viva with minor corrections. Examiners: Dr. Hansung Kim and Dr. Stamos Katsigiannis.
- 12/2024: Our paper Adaptive Graph Learning from Spatial Information for Surgical Workflow Anticipation was accepted by IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics.
- 11/2024: I began serving as a Research Associate at the University of Edinburgh (PI: Dr. Mohsen Khadem).
- 6/2024: Our paper Depth-Aware Endoscopic Video Inpainting was accepted by MICCAI 2024.
- 12/2023: Our paper Pose-based Tremor Type and Level Analysis for Parkinson's Disease from Video was accepted by the International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery.
- 11/2023: I began working as a Research Assistant on the project Course Development in Edge Computing and Analytics 2.0 (PI: Dr. Anish Jindal).
- 8/2023: Our paper Correlation-Distance Graph Learning for Treatment Response Prediction from rs-fMRI was accepted by ICONIP 2023.
Recent Projects
My recent research emphasizes computer-assisted intervention and healthcare education, concentrating on enhancing clinical and educational practices through the direct application of advanced machine learning.
Additionally, I maintain an interest in clinical outcome analysis, exploring both patient outcomes and the mechanisms underpinning them.
I am incredibly thankful to my supervisors and collaborators and enjoy exploring new domains through collaborations.
If you have questions or would like to work together, please feel free to reach out through email at
xiatian.zhang@durham.ac.uk.
Grants Involved
-
U-care: Deep Ultraviolet Light Therapies
Research Associate, EPSRC Grant: £6,132,366 (PI: Dr. Mohsen Khadem)
Funded by UKRI, 2021–2026 (I joined in 2024) -
Course Development in Edge Computing and Analytics 2.0
Research Assistant, UK-Egypt Trans-National Education (TNE) Grant: £30,000 (PI: Dr. Anish Jindal)
Funded by the British Council, UK, 2022–2024 -
Pose Estimation for Health Professional Education: Development of an Objective Computerized Approach for Measuring and Assessing Technical Competencies in Nursing
Research Assistant, Northumbria University Application Seed Funding Scheme: £16,428 (PI: Dr. Merryn Constable)
Funded by Northumbria University, UK, 2022
Research
My previous research can be primarily categorized into three parts: Computer-assisted Intervention, Clinical Outcome Analysis, and Evidence-based Medicine. Below are some of my selected publications. A complete list of my publications can be found on my Google Scholar page.
Conference Papers:
- Depth-Aware Endoscopic Video Inpainting
Francis Xiatian Zhang, Shuang Chen, Xianghua Xie and Hubert P. H. Shum
MICCAI 2024 | paper | arXiv | code - Correlation-Distance Graph Learning for Treatment Response Prediction from rs-fMRI
Oral Presentation
Francis Xiatian Zhang, Sisi Zheng, Hubert P. H. Shum, Haozheng Zhang, Nan Song, Mingkang Song and Hongxiao Jia
ICONIP 2023 | paper | arXiv | code - Towards Graph Representation Learning Based Surgical Workflow Anticipation
Oral Presentation
Francis Xiatian Zhang, Noura Al Moubayed and Hubert P. H. Shum
BHI 2022 | paper | arXiv | code | video - Pose-Based Tremor Classification for Parkinson's Disease Diagnosis from Video
Haozheng Zhang, Edmond S. L. Ho, Francis Xiatian Zhang and Hubert P. H. Shum
MICCAI 2022 | paper | arXiv | code
Journal Papers:
- Adaptive Graph Learning From Spatial Information for Surgical Workflow Anticipation
Francis Xiatian Zhang, Jingjing Deng, Robert Lieck and Hubert P. H. Shum
IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics 2024 | paper | arXiv | code - Pose-based Tremor Type and Level Analysis for Parkinson's Disease from Video
Haozheng Zhang, Edmond S. L. Ho, Francis Xiatian Zhang, Silvia Del Din and Hubert P. H. Shum
International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery 2024 | arXiv | code
Experience
- Research Associate at The University of Edinburgh, 03/2025-.
Description: Developing a novel deep learning-based visual navigation system for bronchoscopic robotics
PI: Dr Mohsen Khadem - Research Assistant at Durham University, 10/2023-11/2023;7/2024-9/2024.
Project: Course Development in Edge Computing and Analytics 2.0
PI: Dr Anish Jindal - Demonstrator at Durham University, 11/2021-6/2024.
Undergraduate Module: 1st Year Module: Computational Thinking, 2nd Year Module: Data Science,
Postgraduate Module: Programming for Data Science, Text Mining and Language Analytics - Student Helper at Durham University, 08/2022-09/2022.
The 21st annual ACM SIGGRAPH / Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation (SCA 2022) - Research Assistant at Northumbria University, 04/2022-07/2022.
Project: Pose Estimation for Health Professional Education: Development of an Objective Computerized Approach for Measuring and Assessing Technical Competencies in Nursing
PI: Dr Merryn Constable