MRI story: Are our celebrity priorities misplaced?

Article By : Bill Schweber

We give considerable attention to Hollywood-type celebrities, but what about giving some to those who really create our technology developments?

Raymond Damadian, M.D. died at age 86 this past August, an event which received little attention. So, who was he and why should we care?

In brief, he made the discovery that is the basis for magnetic resonance scanning, which showed that there is a marked difference in relaxation times between normal and abnormal tissues of the same type, as well as between different types of normal tissues. Furthermore, to make this discovery tangible, he also built the first—admittedly crude—magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine.

The MRI systems, originally called nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) imaging, work by aligning molecules in a strong magnetic field, then looking at the signals they radiate when the field is removed and they return to their resting state. “Physics of MRI – Detailed” is one of many reasonably technical but equation-free descriptions of MRI principles.

What disturbs me about Dr. Damadian’s death is not his passing itself, but how little attention it received. It shows yet again that we consider it newsworthy when a Hollywood, music, or art celebrity does something “special” or passes away due to age, disease, bad luck, or risky behavior (provide your own name here). However, we don’t give comparable attention to those who have truly made a dramatic difference in our lives. MRI scanning is certainly one of those advances, as it’s revealing, safe, and non-invasive, among other virtues.

The fact that his death was largely ignored in favor of the usual celebrity news and hijinks tells me that we have our priorities scrambled. We’d be in a much worse place if Dr. Damadian had not devised and built that first MRI.

The MRI story

Dr. Damadian’s role in MRI is quite a story in itself. His original four-page 1971 paper “Tumor Detection by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance” did not cover the MRI system but was almost entirely medical, detailing his experiment which demonstrated that cancerous tissue could be identified using the nuclear precession principle. He received a patent in 1974 for an “Apparatus and Method for Detecting Cancer in Tissue,” the first MRI-related patent.

The system block diagram shows how much of the design and circuitry was analog, with just a modest amount of computing power to decode the signals and create a crude image (Figure 1). Of course, today’s MRI systems are far more digital, but there is still a significant amount of analog circuitry needed for the real-world interface aspects.

Figure 1 This block diagram from Dr. Damadian’s MRI system patent shows the complexity of his mostly analog prototype in putting theory into practice. Source: U.S. Patent 3,789,832; 1974

He and his team completed construction of a whole-body MRI scanner in 1977. They built the entire machine dubbed “Indomitable” themselves, including winding the magnet coils and plumbing the superconducting-magnet subsystem (Figure 2).

Figure 2 Next to the first human MRI scanner machine constructed in 1977 are, left to right, R. Damadian, L. Minkoff, and M. Goldsmith. Source: Fonar.

The first test was a failure, but Damadian and his team realized the problem: it was too large for the sensor array and induced excessive loading of the antenna of the RF coils. So, one of his graduate students, Dr. Larry Minkoff, volunteered to take his place and after nearly five hours, the first human scan was complete (Figure 3). Compare this to Figure 4, a scan of approximately the same area with a more-modern MRI system.

Figure 3 An early MRI scan from Damadian’s team shows a cross-section of Goldsmith’s chest at the level of the eight thoracic vertebrae. Source: Fonar

Figure 4 This 2006 MRI scan covers roughly the same body area as that early MRI of Dr. Goldsmith’s chest; note the greatly improved clarity and resolution. Source: Wikipedia

In 1978, Dr. Damadian formed FONAR (Field Focused Nuclear Magnetic Resonance), and in 1980, he produced the first commercial unit. However, for technical reasons, he had to abandon his original MRI technique in favor of a variation developed by other researchers, including Paul Lauterbur and Sir Peter Mansfield. His 1980 paper “Field focusing n.m.r. (FONAR) and the formation of chemical images in man” provided an overview of the construction of the machine, the underlying analysis, and the data. It combined medical insight with deep physics and engineering discussion.

Damadian and Fonar received royalties on their patents from many large companies to use the technology. But General Electric would not acknowledge its validity; Fonar eventually prevailed via the Supreme Court and received a $129 million ruling against GE. However, it took over a decade of litigation.

The Nobel Prize twist

In a strange and harsh twist, Lauterbur and Mansfield were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2003 for their work on MRI, but the award did not include Dr. Damadian. It’s important to note that Nobel rules do allow for up to three recipients. This sparked a dispute over “proper credit” for MRI, which went on for many years with vocal adherents on both sides, complete with public campaigns, letters in scientific journals, press conferences, debates at conferences, and even full-page newspaper ads. All of which was a rather unusual spectacle for the scientific community.

Despite this snub, he received many other honors, including the National Medal of Technology. He was also inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame of the United States Patent Office for his pioneer patent of MRI; his original Indomitable MRI machine is in the Smithsonian Institution.

His non-recognition when he passed away is not the only such example, of course. Dr. Charles Kuen Kao received the Nobel Prize in physics in 2009 for this key role in the development of theory and manufacturing of pure, coated optical fibers as a communication medium. Yet his passing in 2018 was also largely unnoticed outside the science and engineering communities.

Have you ever been frustrated by the amount of attention and recognition given to celebrities of little actual accomplishment, compared to scientists and engineers who actually discover and create? Or are you resigned to this being just the way things are with human nature and the never-ending publicity and attention machine? Does such celebrity focus fulfill some inherent human need or is it an artificial construct?

 

This article was originally published on Planet Analog.

Bill Schweber is an electronics engineer who has written three textbooks on electronic communications systems, as well as hundreds of technical articles, opinion columns, and product features. In past roles, he worked as a technical website manager for multiple EE Times sites and as both Executive Editor and Analog Editor at EDN. At Analog Devices, he was in marketing communications; as a result, he has been on both sides of the technical PR function, presenting company products, stories, and messages to the media and also as the recipient of these. Prior to the marcom role at Analog, Bill was Associate Editor of its respected technical journal, and also worked in its product marketing and applications engineering groups. Before those roles, he was at Instron Corp., doing hands-on analog- and power-circuit design and systems integration for materials-testing machine controls. He has a BSEE from Columbia University and an MSEE from the University of Massachusetts, is a Registered Professional Engineer, and holds an Advanced Class amateur radio license. He has also planned, written, and presented online courses on a variety of engineering topics, including MOSFET basics, ADC selection, and driving LEDs.

 

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