Invivo Corp., a subsidiary of Intermagnetics General Corp., has been awarded a $500,000 Department of Defense grant to develop an integrated hardware and software system that will enable high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of traumatic brain injuries and promote substantially more effective diagnosis and treatment in many difficult cases. Invivo is partnering with the Office of Naval Research on the project, according to a release.

"We believe Invivo's advanced MRI radio frequency coils, which enable highly detailed organ-specific imaging, combined with modifications to our innovative DynaCad computer-aided diagnostic system will provide the solution the military is seeking,” said Tom Schubert, chief technology officer of Invivo. "Currently computed tomography (CT) is the main radiological tool for diagnosing traumatic brain injury patients. Yet every radiologist is aware that CT's effectiveness in assessing brain trauma is limited to visualizing fractures and significant hematomas, but is ineffective in diagnosing more subtle injuries,” Schubert added.

Schubert noted that the Invivo system would be used in the highest-field MRI systems available. Invivo expects to deliver evaluation models of both the advanced imaging hardware and the analysis software this year.