PTB News 1/2009 (5.7 MB) PTB News 1/2009, English edition, Issue April 2009A new nuclear spin tomograph (magnetic resonance tomograph, MRT) of the modern 7 Tesla generation has been put into operation in the Experimental and Clinical Research Center of the Max Delbrück Centre for Molecular Medicine in Berlin-Buch. It is the only 7 Tesla device wordwide in which a metrology institute is involved. As project partner, PTB is responsible for exploring the technical possibilities of the new device and for making it usable for clinical applications.
In hospitals, MRT devices with magnetic fields of the strength 1.5 Tesla or 3 Tesla are usually used. The 7-tesla tomograph will at first be purely a research instrument in order to explore the possibilities of the ultra-high-field magnetic resonance tomography. Whereas most of the approx. 30 MRTs with such a high magnetic field which are at present available in the world are predominantly used for brain research, the new device in Berlin-Buch will be used for multiple purposes. As one of four in the world, the Berlin system is equipped with an 8-channel transmission system. By this, heart imaging by means of 7 Tesla MRT is, for the first time, the focus of attention.
New ground could also be broken in the case of the realization of molecular processes in the body, for example in the fight against tumours. Project partners are – in addition to the Max Delbrück Centre and PTB – the Berlin Charité, the Leibniz Institute for Molecular Pharmacology and the Siemens company.