New MR Scanners Pave the Way for Radiology Research's Move to the Snyder Building
The department has just installed two state-of-the-art whole-body MR scanners for research in the soon-to-be-opened Snyder medical research building in the Fontaine Research Park. The two scanners, a 1.5-Tesla Siemens Avanto and a 3-Tesla Siemens Trio, are equipped with cutting edge software and hardware, including capabilities for functional brain imaging, diffusion tensor imaging, and imaging of various nuclei such as phosphorous, hyperpolarized helium-3 and hyperpolarized xenon-129. These new whole-body MR scanners are only part of the imaging resources that will be available in the Snyder building. For small-animal research, imaging equipment will include high-field MRI, microPET, combined CT/SPECT and bioluminescence/fluorescence. For large-animal/human research, the whole-body MR scanners will be complemented by a dual-energy CT scanner. A cyclotron and human MR/PET scanner are planned for the future. Other key components of the new research space include laboratories for synthesizing new molecular and cellular imaging agents and for studying vascular biology and disease.
The Snyder building (originally named the ART - Advanced Research and Technology - building) is scheduled to open in spring 2008. Researchers from the Department of Radiology will occupy approximately 14,000 square feet of laboratory and office space, and share the building with researchers from several other departments in the School of Medicine.