MRI: Acquisition of a High Field Magnetic Resonance Imaging System for Science and Engineering Research

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NSF MRI Proposal (R. L. Magin, P. I.)Acquisition of a High Field Magnetic Resonance Imaging System for Science and Engineering ResearchAbstractTechnical Description The applications of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and spectroscopy (MRS) are rapidly expanding beyond the traditional domains of chemistry and medicine. Engineers, biologists, and even artists are seeing their problems in new ways through the use of non-contact, radiation free and fully three dimensional MR imaging. The flow of fluids, the efficiency of catalysts, the strength of polymers, and the hidden structure of developing plants can all be viewed with micron scale resolution and in time periods as short as a fraction of a second. Neuroscientists can probe models of memory and cognition, while chemical engineers can study processes from the molecular to the industrial scale. This is all achieved using special MRI techniques that encode system structure, function, and dynamics. Significance & Impact The overall goal of this proposal is to bring the imaging and analytical power of MRI (Bruker 9.4 T imaging spectrometer) to a larger community of engineers and scientists at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). We plan to operate the system under the jurisdiction of the UIC Research Resources Center in a dedicated campus research space. The new MRI will also be the principal imaging system for undergraduate and graduate laboratory courses in magnetic resonance imaging and a key asset for REU, RET and K-12 outreach programs at UIC. In this manner we will increase the shared access of these campus communities to state of the art magnetic resonance imaging.