Quantitative MRI: Increasing the Sensitivity and Stability of Magnetic Resonance Imaging

The meteoric advancement of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology in the last two decades introduced a new and incredibly diverse set of tools, offering what is probably the most efficient way of investigating anatomy, physiology, and cognitive processes in vivo. Notwithstanding these major advances, MRI is far from fulfilling its full potential and is still limited in two main aspects: (A) it is a fundamentally qualitative tool that is visually interpreted and hence lacks across-the-board standardization, and (B) it is limited to probing macroscopic (millimetric) features, thereby missing essential microscopic details such as cellular structure and physiology.

In this talk, I will present a quantitative MRI (qMRI) approach, which serves as a platform for addressing these limitations, and aims to transform MRI from a high-end camera to an accurate and quantitative measuring device. An example for the effectiveness of qMRI will be presented, showing its ability to probe and detect pathology in otherwise normal appearing tissues in multiple sclerotic patients.