Metabolic MR ‘could offer second-by-second tumour assessment’

General Electric Healthcare (GE Healthcare) announced earlier this week that it had developed a method to track changes in tumours on a second-by-second basis.

The magnetic resonance imaging technology, Metabolic MR, has been made possible by a breakthrough in the enrichment process of the carbon isotope C13, which is used as a contrast agent by the imaging system, reports Reuters. As a result of this process, the MR imaging signal has been increased by around 10,000 times

Speaking to Reuters, Jonathan Murray, a project leader at GE Healthcare, said that although the technology is at an early state of development, clinical trials could be in place by 2012.

Mr Murray also said that the method could be of particular use in detecting prostate cancer, as it allows the disease to be detected at an earlier stage of development.

“We can see it in real time, before a lump, before you can feel it, in many ways before it’s too late,” the project leader explained.

GE Healthcare develops a range of medical technologies, including medical imaging and information, medical diagnostics, patient monitoring systems, medical diagnostics and patient monitoring systems.

Last month the firm acquired protein interaction analysis systems provider Biacore International – a move that Peter Ehrenheim, chief executive of GE Healthcare Life Sciences, described as a one which would provide “added value for our customers in biomedical and drug discovery research”.