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NeuroSpin - A unique imaging platform


The goal of NeuroSpin is to push the current limits of brain imaging, from the mouse to man, as far as possible with very high magnetic field Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR). NMR imaging (MRI) can be used to observe deep organs totally non-invasively. The more intense the magnetic field, the greater the sensitivity, allowing more details to be seen. Benefiting from CEA know-how in the conception of magnets and NMR, this technical platform will be equipped with unrivalled NMR imaging tools.

Located in Saint-Aubin, within the CEA Saclay center, this imaging platform will be unique in Europe. It will bring together exceptional resources and very efficient tools (original supraconducting magnets, powerful computers, laboratories, multidisciplinary teams…). It will complete the existing installations at the Service Hospitalier Frédéric Joliot in Orsay dedicated to radioisotope imaging and, in particular, positon emission tomography (PET).

Grouping physicists and neurobiologists, in close collaboration with other government research agencies and universities, in particular from the Paris Region, open to the national and international community, the NeuroSpin platform will co-ordinate research, provide a network of skills and an optimisation of means. About 150 researchers, physicians, students, engineers, technicians, … are expected to develop innovative tools and methodologies, and apply them to neurobiology at large, from neurogenetics and neurophysiology to cognitive neurosciences and clinical neurology..

Federating a great many regional, national and international partnerships, NeuroSpin will be a true drive towards technological innovation and distribution that will also contribute the industrial and economic fabric of the Paris Region.
3D display MRI
of a brain hemisphere showing sulci and connections.
 
 
3D display MRI
of a brain hemisphere showing sulci and connections.
3D display of MRI (anatomy) and PET images (distribution of neurotransmitters in the basal ganglia).

Photos: CEA, Inserm, CEA/C, Dupont, CEA/L, Médard, CEA/M, Grassi, Inserm/Lachapelle, AP-HP/Inserm/CEA