April 16, 2001
Contact: Amy DiCresce, (313) 577-1429, adicresc@med.wayne.edu

WSU gets highest-power human MRI scanner in state; will advance medicine, research

It doesn’t look much different, but what it sees is incredible.

When the 4T MRI system arrives at the Wayne State University School of Medicine in April 2001, it will be the highest field MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scanner in the state, and one of only 10 in the country.

MRI scanners like this are critical to medical and scientific discoveries, because they provide the clearest pictures to date of the structures, chemicals and functions within the brain –and a larger magnet equals better clarity and precision. This glimpse inside the brain can lead to important advances in many diseases and abnormalities including: depression, stroke, epilepsy, Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, pediatric metabolic disorders, autism, migraines, brain tumors and traumatic brain injury.

Wayne State currently has several 1.5 Tesla, or 1.5T MRI scanners, which have been used in important studies, but these are not powerful enough to provide the most detailed views. The 4T, with a magnetic field that is almost three-times more powerful, can provide real-time views of the human brain. For instance, if a person taps his finger, you could watch the motor cortex simultaneously responding and conducting that motion. It can also pinpoint the smallest structures and tumors, allowing surgeons to find the precise location of a seizure or cancerous growth. In addition, the 4T measures more than 40 chemicals in the brain—a point that is critical to drug discovery and an understanding of many mental illnesses caused by chemical imbalances.

“With this new scanner, we hope to be able to predict what medications will be effective in individuals with various brain disorders, and then actually better understand the disease process itself: What’s causing someone to be depressed? Is it a specific chemical in the brain? What’s causing a child to have an obsessive-compulsive disorder? Is a particular region of the brain altered? With the 4T scanner, we’ll have the opportunity to nail these things down,” said Gregory Moore, PhD, director of the Brain Imaging Research Division at the WSU School of Medicine.

Although several Michigan institutions currently have 3T scanners, the 4T scanner will be the first and only ultra high-field MR scanner in the state. Furthermore, through extensive partnerships between pediatric researchers at Wayne State and physicians at Children’s Hospital of Michigan, WSU will be one of the few sites using its 4T magnet to study childhood illnesses and younger patients.

Like PET technology (positron emission tomography), the 4T scanner will be utilized for clinical research studies in patients. Many years ago, people were skeptical that PET was only a research tool, but insurance companies now pay for PET scans for the diagnosis and treatment of a number of medical and neurologic conditions. Dr. Moore says that while the 4T MR scanner will be dedicated entirely to clinical research investigations, he expects that the findings from these studies will have a direct impact on how we treat patients with devastating brain illnesses.

Thomas Uhde, MD, associate dean for research and graduate programs at the WSU School of Medicine, said the acquisition of this ultra high-field MR scanner is an integral component of WSU’s research excellence. “Wayne State has been at the forefront of neuroimaging for some time. This new scanner will allow us to distinguish ourselves as a premiere imaging site—one of only a select few in the country. This gives us the means to carry out leading neuroscience research that is expected to produce important results.”

Facts about Wayne State University’s 4T MRI scanner:

The 4T MRI scanner is approximately 12 feet tall, 10 feet long, and weighs 17 tons.

The superconducting magnet stores enough electricity to light the entire city of Detroit for a brief period of time.

The 4T scanner will be housed in the newly constructed WSU Neuroimaging Research Facility located at Harper University Hospital, where WSU and Detroit Medical Center researchers and physicians can access it.

WSU’s brain imaging team and collaborators consist of more than 25 faculty members from 10 departments who have expertise in this area, and they are prepared to train and mentor other researchers in utilizing the technology.

Cost of the scanner itself is approximately $5 million, but the total budget to acquire and house the scanner and related scientific equipment is nearly $14 million.

Other institutions with ultra high-field MR scanners include Harvard, Duke, Columbia, Yale, University of Alabama-Birmingham, University of California at San Diego, Ohio State and University of Pennsylvania. All of them have obtained substantial research grant funding, based on the advanced research capabilities of the scanner.