- Title: Read my mind: French researchers building world's most powerful MRI scanner
- Date: 18th September 2019
- Summary: SACLAY, FRANCE (SEPTEMBER 17, 2019) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF MAGNET ENGINEER FOR PROJECT ISEULT, LIONEL QUETTIER, SHOWING CONDUCTOR COIL (SOUNDBITE) (French) MAGNET ENGINEER FOR PROJECT ISEULT, LIONEL QUETTIER, SAYING: "The Iseult magnet will generate a magnetic field of 11.7 Teslas. We need a very high magnetic field to produce a very high-resolution image. 11.7 Tesla is 230,000 times stronger than the Earth's magnetic field. Compare that with the usual magnets in hospitals, which measure around 3 Teslas." VARIOUS OF CONDUCTOR COILS (SOUNDBITE) (French) MAGNET ENGINEER FOR PROJECT ISEULT, LIONEL QUETTIER, SAYING: "We still have until the end of the year for tests. A number of things have already been put in place, but the main part of the Siemens installation will start in early 2020. Then, we'll redo the same tests that we are currently conducting, but with MRI equipment, and by late 2020 or around 2021, we'll have our first image." SIGN FOR NEUROSPIN HALLWAY
- Embargoed: 2nd October 2019 16:08
- Keywords: science technology Paris medicine MRI brain imaging Alzheimer's disease health magnets neurosciences
- Location: GRAPHIC / SACLAY, FRANCE / TEL AVIV, ISRAEL / LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
- City: GRAPHIC / SACLAY, FRANCE / TEL AVIV, ISRAEL / LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
- Country: France
- Topics: Science
- Reuters ID: LVA006AX6QM3F
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Researchers in France are developing an MRI scanner using a supermagnet that would produce brain imaging of a much higher resolution, and could better explain neurological functions and detect illnesses at their onset.
The giant magnet, which is being developed through Project Iseult at the Neurospin facility near Paris, could help better diagnose maladies such as Alzheimer's disease, the team says.
"We hope that this magnet would allow us... to better understand our brain and how it works, and to study characteristics of what is special to the human species, things like music, mathematics and language," Project Iseult Scientific Director Nicolas Boulant told Reuters on Tuesday (September 17).
Magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, uses strong magnetic fields and radio waves to produce detailed images from inside the body.
Project Iseult's new supermagnet measures 5 metres in length and 5 metres (16ft.) in diameter, about as long as a sedan, and weighs 130 metric tonnes, the weight of a blue whale. It is built by layering 170 "double pancake" superconductor coils of niobium-titanium alloy. A total of 182 kilometres (113 miles) of wire made of the alloy were used for the magnet.
The apparatus emits a magnetic field of 11.7 Teslas; 230,000 times stronger than the Earth's, the project's magnet engineer Lionel Quettier said.
Once in place, the Iseult could produce images 10 times clearer than those obtained with today's most advanced MRI machine, which has a magnetic field of 7 Teslas. Classic hospital MRI machines emit 1 to 3 Teslas of magnetic field.
But Quettier said Iseult's machine would not be ready for at least another year. Project engineers are currently conducting tests on the magnet, but the main part of the development would start in early 2020, when the apparatus would be examined with actual MRI equipment.
"Then, we'll redo the same tests that we are currently conducting, and by late 2020 or around 2021, we'll have our first image," Quettier said.
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