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Magnetic resonance imaging: the long path to the patient

4min
Philipp Grätzel von Grätz
Published on 19. November 2020

The development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is an exciting story of innovation spanning four decades – if not several centuries – and two Nobel prizes. But the fact that MRI scanners are now used in patient care all over the world is also thanks to industrial research and development.

A mathematician from the time of Napoleon

Nikola Tesla in his laboratory.

Back then a genius, today a unit of magnetism

Nobel prize for magnetic resonance

The first wooden MR research laboratory, Erlangen, 1979.

Use on living organisms - and another Nobel prize

MR image of a bell pepper, 1980.

MRI let loose in Germany - on a pepper

Tesla magnet with Faraday cage, 1979.

Giant tubes rolled out

Examination with the first MAGNETOM, 1983.

Finding its way into routine

Examination with the first MAGNETOM, 1983.
A greener footprint in MRI

A special kind of coolant

More powerful, more usable, and less time-consuming

A Milestone reached


By Philipp Grätzel von Grätz

Philipp Grätzel von Grätz lives and works as a freelance medical journalist in Berlin. His specialties are digitalization, technology, and cardiovascular therapy.