Scientists at GE Global Research (GRC) are working on a high-resolution imaging helmet that may allow doctors to better understand the workings of the brain and conduct studies to determine how to prevent brain disease such as Alzheimer’s and Autism.

According to Global Technology Director for Diagnostics and Biomedical Technologies at GE Global Research, Dr Nadeem Ishaque, “Many important classes of neurons and glial cells remain undetectable by imaging techniques because of their very low concentration but this device could help us understand how brain circuits and networks work and how they are organised.“

The wearable device will also capture the body’s functions and be used to study the spread of cancer and the response to cancer treatment. Additionally, it may be used to detect individual cells while looking for misfolded proteins and signs of neurological disorders.

Medical professionals and researchers image the brain while a patient is lying down, but the helmet would allow them to move around while their brain is being observed on a cellular level and monitored for motor activity.

The helmet will use positron emission tomography (PET) detectors much smaller and slimmer than the standard, whole-body PET scanner. With a traditional PET, doctors inject a patient with tracer molecules that attach themselves to target tissues. The tracers comprise of radioactive isotopes which allow physicians to listen for signals and measure their distribution.

“You can spot cancer cells dividing this way,” said GRC Functional Imaging Laboratory Manager, Ravindra Manjeshwar. GE scientists have developed new groups of tracers to zero in on amyloid plaque, tau proteins and neuroinflammation which are believed to be associated with Alzheimer’s. The helmet developers will reduce the amount of tracers required for imaging. “Micro-doses would reduce radiation exposure to patients to roughly the equivalent of a cross-country flight while still delivering high-resolution images.”

“If successful, this effort would represent a monumental advancement in imaging technology that will help scientists understand brain function in normal and diseased states,” said Ishaque. The helmet also has the potential to help develop novel treatment and diagnostic strategies to apply to brain diseases.

“The human brain is the most complicated biological structure in the known universe,” said Director of the National Institute of Health (NIH), Francis Collins. “We’ve only just scratched the surface in understanding how it works or, unfortunately, doesn’t quite work when disorders and disease occur.”

The helmet is a project of U.S President, Barrack Obama’s, Brain Initiative which was launched in 2013. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), GE and Google will share $ 46 million from the initiative’s fund to expand the understanding of the human brain. The helmet is being developed by GE in partnership with the West Virginia University, the University of Washington and California-Davis.

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