Re: MRI questions ?

From: Michael M. Butler (butler@comp-lib.org)
Date: Sat Nov 10 2001 - 17:49:46 MST


I seem to recall that MRI (nee NMI) is the granddady of the field--no ionizing radiation, but rather slow and as a
consequence somewhat blurry, depending on how rigidly one can bench the scanned part(s).

Your basic CT (nee CAT) scan is usually done with a big slowly-rotating radiation source, IIRC, and can sometimes reveal
more information but at the cost of a dose of gamma.

You might want to check out EBT (electron beam tomography, also known as EBCT); there are various tradeoffs.
www.heartscan.com is an interesting place to look; were you to email them, they might give you answers. The biggest
payoff in using EBT is for tissues that are hard to image because they are floppy or squishy and move: hearts, other
chest and abdominal organs, and possibly CNS.

Reading between the lines at www.heartscan.com,

Time: I'd guess a head-to-toe baseline EBT scan shouldn't take more than two hours, and perhaps as little as one hour.
That's including the initial quick look to confirm a good picture. They offer you a CD of the imaging, but I assume it's
POVrayed (or whatever) and lower res than the collected data. So I'd guess the actual data is gigabytes, but I don't
feel like doing a back-of-the-envelope that might be off by three orders of magnitude :).

Resolution: Again, using EBT, it appears to me that sub-millimeter features can be routinely detected. I don't know if
the raw collected data is .3, .2, or .1 millimter, or what.

By the bye, googling tomography gets one lots of interesting links.

MMB

ABlainey@aol.com wrote:
>
> I need some tech details about MRI scanners, can anyone help ?.
> 1. What is the max resolution of current scanners (in mm or inch pref)
> 2. How long would it take to scan a whole body, top to toe ?
> 3. What sort of storage media size would be needed for a full body scan ?. in GB
> 4. What type of filesystem would the storage media use, VFF etc
> These are a few questions I need answered for a project im thinking about. It is for anthoform robot parts based on a
> specific persons body structure. The main direction will be for artificial limbs with full range of movement and
> control at normal speed.
> If anyone has experience of making air muscles, any advise would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> Alex.

-- 
My moronic mnemonic for smart behavior: "DICKS" == 
diplomacy, integrity, courage, kindness, skepticism.


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