Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) offers tremendous opportunities for advancing medical imaging research. MRI, unlike most other medical imaging modalities, can use a wide variety of contrast mechanisms, each of which provides unique information about not only anatomical structure, but also physiological function and in-vivo biochemistry. Unfortunately, the method MRI has used for encoding spatial information into images - the switching of magnetic field gradients - is very slow, making it difficult or impossible to access the full richness of potentially available information in reasonable times. The emerging technique of parallel MRI can alleviate this image encoding bottleneck and unlock the full potential of MRI. Parallel MRI uses arrays of radiofrequency (RF) receiver coils to replace a substantial fraction of the time-consuming image encoding done by switching magnetic field gradients. With many coils in an array, tenfold and higher efficiency gains in image encoding can be realized.

How can Parallel MRI be used to advance interventional medicine?

         Parallel MRI techniques are widely applicable to the complete array of MR methods that use gradients to encode spatial information. This includes standard proton (1H) imaging at any field strength, transmission of RF pulses, multinuclear (non 1H) imaging, spectroscopic imaging (chemical shift imaging), and imaging with hyperpolarized nuclei. Parallel MRI can be used to enhance virtually any existing study and can often make otherwise impractical studies feasible.

Current research applications include:

1. Hepatic fat content measurement
2. Prostate cancer biopsy guidance
3. Tracking hyperpolarized metabolites in vivo
4. Volumetric regional fat distribution (Shown Below)