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Book Cover
E-book
Author Dawson, M. Joan, 1944-2017

Title Paul Lauterbur and the invention of MRI / M. Joan Dawson
Published Cambridge, Massachusetts : The MIT Press, [2013]
©2013

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Description 1 online resource (xv, 273 pages) : illustrations
Contents Foreword / Edwin D. Becker -- Epiphany in a hamburger -- Portrait of a scientist as a young man -- Study, work, and war -- Early breakthroughs -- The 1960s : Stony Brook, Stanford, and spectrometers -- The first fruitful weeks -- The worldwide laboratory -- Baby grows up -- Among the corn fields -- The end and the beginning
Summary On September 2, 1971, the chemist Paul Lauterbur had an idea that would change the practice of medical research. Considering research findings about the use of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) signals to detect tumors in tissue samples, Lauterbur realized that the information from NMR signals could be recovered in the form of images - and thus obtained noninvasively from a living subject. It was an unexpected epiphany: he was eating a hamburger at the time. Lauterbur rushed out to buy a notebook in which to work out his idea; he completed his notes a few days later. He had discovered the basic method used in all MRI scanners around the world, and for this discovery he would share the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 2003. This book, by Lauterbur's wife and scientific partner, M. Joan Dawson, is the story of Paul Lauterbur's discovery and the subsequent development of the most important medical diagnostic tool since the X-ray. With MRI, Lauterbur had discovered an entirely new principle of imaging. Dawson explains the science behind the discovery and describes Lauterbur's development of the idea, his steadfastness in the face of widespread skepticism and criticism, and related work by other scientists, including Peter Mansfield (Lauterbur's Nobel co-recipient), and Raymond Damadian (who famously feuded with Lauterbur over credit for the ideas behind MRI). She offers not only the story of one man's passion for his work, but also a case study of how science is actually done: a flash of insight followed by years of painstaking work. -- Jacket
Analysis BIOMEDICAL SCIENCES/General
HUMANITIES/Biography & Autobiography
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages [255]-267) and index
Notes Print version record
Subject Lauterbur, Paul C., 1929-2007.
SUBJECT Lauterbur, Paul C., 1929-2007
Lauterbur, Paul C., 1929-2007
Lauterbur, Paul C., 1929-2007 fast
Lauterbur, Paul C. 1929-2007 gnd
Subject Magnetic resonance imaging -- History
Magnetic Resonance Imaging -- history -- Biography
Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy -- instrumentation -- Biography
Nobel Prize -- Biography
HEALTH & FITNESS -- Diseases -- General.
MEDICAL -- Clinical Medicine.
MEDICAL -- Diseases.
MEDICAL -- Evidence-Based Medicine.
MEDICAL -- Internal Medicine.
Magnetic resonance imaging
Genre/Form Electronic books
collective biographies.
Biographies
History
Biographies.
Biographies.
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781461939023
146193902X
1299814476
9781299814479
0262316714
9780262316712
9780262316705
0262316706
9780262316729
0262316722