Magnetic resonance imaging

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a generally noninvasive imaging modality that is highly flexible and configurable and can achieve excellent contrast between soft tissues in the body. Since its invention and initial development in the 1970s, the number of MRI techniques available in the laboratory and the clinic has rapidly expanded. Acquisition parameters can now be customized to generate not only two- and three-dimensional images of anatomical structures in the body but also images showing metabolic activity, blood flow velocities, and even the diffusion characteristics of water molecules in tissue. Application of MRI techniques to the study of cancer is widespread, from detection, diagnosis, and characterization of disease, to tumor response to therapy. This chapter provides background on the fundamental concepts and physics that make magnetic resonance imaging possible and then builds on this framework to provide a description of the most common uses of MRI for cancer in both the clinic and the laboratory.