International Women in Mathematics Day on 12 May celebrates women in maths and aims to inspire others towards maths journeys.

Introducing Dr Gobert Lee, lecturer in statistical science and researcher at Flinders University.

Medical imaging, breast cancer detection on mammograms, radiation dosage – mathematics is critical to all sciences, including modern medicine.

What inspired you towards a career in maths?

When I was in primary school, summer holidays were long and we, children, had plenty of time on our hands. Teachers would assign books of math exercises for us to solve. The more I worked on the problems, the more I found the problems interesting. I wouldn’t say that I was inspired towards a career in mathematics at that time. But I certainly like the challenge.

What is your key area within the broad mathematics disciplines?

I have a PhD in medical image analysis and lecture in statistical science, my research is on statistical pattern recognition, multivariate analysis, machine learning and deep learning as well as the application of statistics in radiologic studies.

My specific expertise is in computer-aided detection of breast cancer on mammograms and breast histopathological images, as well as human voxel model generation for clinical radiation dose estimation.

Can you share any examples of how your work contributes to society?

I was the lead inventor of a provisional patent describing a novel method to detect temporal changes on mammograms, and led the development of the FBIseg tool for full-body CT image segmentation.

The funding and scholarships I have received to further my research include a Channel 7 Children’s Research Foundation grant, a Lyn Wrigley Breast Cancer Research Fund and a post-doctoral Fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

What advice do you have for young people considering a career in maths?

Doing maths is like learning skiing, once you master the basic skills, you would challenge yourself to the next level. Maths is not stand alone – you could find yourself solving interesting problems in different areas.

Your interests can guide you. For me, I have a strong interest in promoting mathematics as a career for women and have helped organised a number of national events in that regard, I have also edited a book and reviewed major funding bodies including the NHMRC.