A French Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), shared, on Tuesday (2), unprecedented high-precision images of the human brain carried out through the resonance machine “most powerful in the world”. The discovery could be important for to detect neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's .
The new images are fruit of more than 20 years of research and development on the Iseult scanner, currently considered as the most powerful magnetic resonance imaging device in the world, having a magnetic field intensity of 11.7 tesla larger than devices normally used in hospitals, which reach a maximum of three teslas.
Iseult was able to acquire images of the human brain in just 4 minutes. On other devices, images of the same quality would be detected after hours and would not be realistic, as, according to the CEA, patients would not feel comfortable and any movement would 'blur' the image.”
The aim of the new machine is to study healthy and diseased human brains using high resolution as support, which will allow us to discover new details related to the anatomy, connections and activity of the human brain.
“Neuroscientists, physicists, mathematicians and doctors have worked together to develop tools and models that will help us better understand how healthy and diseased brains work, expanding the horizons of explorations of the human brain,” explains Anne-Isabelle Etienvre, Director of Fundamental Research of the CEA, in a press release.
“With the Iseult project, a whole new world opens up before our eyes and we are excited to explore it. We still need several years of research to develop and improve our acquisition methods and ensure that the data is of the highest possible quality”, says Nicolas Boulant, Project Head and Research Director at CEA, also in a statement.
Detecting neurodegenerative diseases
The new discovery will have an impact on medical research. According to the CEA, high-precision imaging will support diagnosis and healthcare for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
Furthermore, it will also facilitate the detection of chemical elements that are difficult to capture in magnetic fields lower than Iseult in order to accurately assess their effectiveness in the brain, such as lithium, a compound present in medications used to treat bipolar disorders.
“Our goal is to investigate neurodegenerative diseases by 2026-2030, as well as other diseases that fall more within psychiatry, such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorders. Cognitive sciences will also have a fundamental importance in our research”, highlights Nicolas Boulant.
Source: CNN Brasil
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