Unique doctoral ceremony featuring identical triplets
“Identical triplets are very rare. It happens once in 200 million births. Brazil has a population of only 180 million, so Djalma, who was born in Brazil, is the only triplet in Brazil. And he is probably the only triplet in the world with a PhD, who knows”, said Professor Nico de Jong on Djalma Simões dos Santos’ groundbreaking doctorate at TU Delft on Friday 28 June 2024.
In his thesis ‘Ultrasound transducers for ultrafast 3D cardiovascular imaging’, Djalma describes the development of special ultrasound probes for three different applications: carotid artery imaging, intracardiac echocardiography and abdominal aorta imaging. In addition to Dos Santos’ interesting research, there was another special aspect to his PhD: he and his two paranymphs are identical triplets! As far as we know, this has never happened at TU Delft before, and it was an extraordinary sight: a PhD candidate flanked by two lookalikes.
Professor Nico de Jong: “Djalma successfully defended his thesis on the production of ultrasound matrix transducers for 4D images of the heart, carotid artery, and abdominal aorta. During his defence before an international committee, he was assisted by his two brothers, who had to read out several propositions, ranging from the effective time management of a young father to the reasons why the Hungarian team in 1954, the Dutch team in 1974 and the Brazilian team in 1982 failed to win the World Cup. The new doctor received congratulations at the reception afterwards.
Cardiovascular disease is a leading cause of death worldwide. Effective treatment of these diseases requires early detection. The introduction of population screening allows early detection and intervention, thereby reducing mortality. A widely used technique for assessing cardiovascular disease is ultrasound, because it is easily portable, does not use ionising radiation and is cheaper than other techniques such as MRI and CT scans.
There are two parts to Djalma's thesis. The first deals with the simplification and automation of ultrasound probe testing. The second part looks at the design, manufacture, testing and imaging of special probes using integrated circuits (ASICs). The thesis is available online.
