Richard Watts, Department of Radiology, University of Vermont.
In 1895, just two weeks after he discovered X-rays, Wilhelm Roentgen used this new technique to generate an image of the bones in his wife’s hand. While his wife was disturbed by this discovery, exclaiming that “I have seen my own death!”, this represented the birth of diagnostic radiology. Within a month of the announcement of this discovery, X-rays were being used by surgeons.
The rapid development of medical imaging technology continues to this day, driven by technological developments in seemingly unrelated fields. Advances in computational and analytical techniques enabled the first clinical X-ray computed tomography (CT) scan to be performed by Godfrey Hounsfield in 1971; nuclear magnetic resonance was first described by Isidor Rabi in 1938, yet it was only in 1973 that Paul Lauterbur and Peter Mansfield described a beautifully simple way to generate images from the NMR signal, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was born; the nuclear physics of electron-positron annihilation events and coincidence detection led to the development of positron emission tomography (PET). In addition to diagnosing disease, physicists have important roles to play in treatment. Cancers may be treated using radiation, in which it is critical that a sufficient dose is delivered to the tumor while minimizing collateral damage to surrounding healthy tissue. Recent developments such as intensity-modulated radiotherapy use relatively simple physics concepts to save lives.
I will give an overview of the basic physics underlying many of these techniques, concentrating on medical imaging and my own research area, MRI. UVM has a well-equipped MRI research facility that is used for developing new medical imaging technology, but can also be used for non-human imaging. We actively welcome new collaborations from UVM and beyond.
