Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research
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University of Nebraska Medical Center
Home — Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research — Research Resources — Cores & Shared Resources — UNMC Cores and Shared Resources — Small Animal MRI — Instruments and Services

Instruments and Services

Instruments

The Small Animal MRI Core Facility operates two small bore high field (7 Tesla) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) systems including a Bruker BioSpec (7 Tesla / 21 centimeter) and a Bruker PharmaScan (7 Tesla / 16 centimeter). In addition, computing equipment is available for image storage, analysis, custom computer program development and database development. 

  • 7 Tesla MRI system (Bruker BioSpec, 21 centimeter bore) for imaging large rats, rabbits and marmoset monkeys
  • 7 Tesla MRI system (Bruker PharmaScan, 16 centimeter bore) for mice and rats
  • Two Image Analysis Workstations (Dell Precision 7920 Tower, Windows 10 Pro and Ubuntu Linux 20.04) 
  • Image data analysis software: VivoQuant, BrainVoyager, NeoSoft SuiteHeart, AnalyzeDirect, Amira, LCModel, IDL 
  • RF coil and animal holder building: Instruments include a 3D printer, oscilloscopes, RF sweepers, frequency generators, a table saw, a drilling machine and a lathe

7 Tesla MRI System (Bruker BioSpec, 21 Centimeter Bore) 
The relatively large bore of BioSpec allows the imaging of large rats, rabbits, marmoset monkeys and more. The system has two transmitting channels enable to acquire signals of nuclei other than hydrogen. The four receiving channels of the system coupled with a four-element mouse brain array coil facilitate rapid imaging for diffusion tensor imaging and functional MRI. 

7 Tesla MRI System (Bruker PharmaScan, 16 Centimeter Bore)
The PharmaScan is used to scan mice and rats. The system is equipped with a variety of coils including a mouse brain volume coil, a mouse body / rat brain volume coil, and a rat body coil. 

Services

  • MRI of Small Animals 
    The Small Animal MRI Core Facility operates two small bore high field (7 Tesla) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) systems providing quantitative imaging capabilities for small animals. 
  • Image Analysis 
    The Small Animal MRI Core Facility provides image analysis service to preclinical as well as clinical researchers with cutting-edge image analysis methods to support their imaging- based research needs. Services include image data format exchanges, visualization, image registration, segmentation, lesion/tumor segmentation, a fusion of multimodal images, volumetric measurements, and data analysis using artificial neural networks. These tools help to detect structural, functional, biochemical, and molecular alterations due to disease. These are also instrumental in studying the biodistribution of new drug formulations. 
  • RF Coil / Animal Holder Building  
    The Small Animal MRI Core Facility is equipped with electrical and mechanical instruments and tools to design and build radiofrequency coils and animal holders for animal imaging studies.