Q&A with Tom Hilbert, David Norris and Tobias Kober

In today’s interview, we highlight the recent work by first author Tom Hilbert, along with co-author David Norris and last author Tobias Kober from Siemens Healthcare in Lausanne Switzerland and the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition, and Behavior at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands. Their paper is titled “Fast model-based T2 mapping using SAR-reduced simultaneous multislice excitation”.

For those who would like to get a quick overview of our discussion, below is an annotation of the interview. Clicking on the timestamp will take you to the exact video location where the topic is discussed.

<br /> 0:30 - Audioslides prepared by Tom

<br /> 6:14 - The authors give us an overview of their backgrounds and how they got involved in the field of MRI/NMR.

10:40 - Tom explains how his PhD work evolved into this exciting collaborative project.

12:54 - What is special about the PINS pulses?

17:36 - The signal modeling used in the project is based on numerical simulations, as opposed to a traditional analytical mono-exponential decay approach.

20:34 - A comparison of the T2 maps reconstructed with the proposed technique against competing methods (Figure 5).

22:30 - The authors talk about the speed-up achieved with the proposed method.

24:20 - A discussion of the potential clinical applications (cartilage imaging, fast knee acquisition, prostate imaging), and the challenges that need to be overcome.

29:25 - The authors emphasize the power of teamwork, and how much they enjoy the social part of such collaborations.