Image credit – Facebook
We’ve all seen it on TV or in movies, where sometimes when a character needs to undergo an MRI scan, they get a bit worried namely because these MRI machines can be loud and also confined, which is of course not doing anyone with claustrophobia any favors. However researchers from Facebook and NYU’s School of Medicine want to help improve on that.
The researchers have teamed up to develop AI that could help speed up MRI scans. While the claustrophobic nature of an MRI machine and its sounds are something that probably could be improved upon, the researchers are hoping that by speeding up the scans, it will make the process more efficient and less harrowing for patients involved.
According to researchers, these scans typically take 15 minutes to over an hour, depending on what doctors are looking for. In order to speed up the process, less data needs to be captured, but the use of AI will help fill in those gaps. The researchers liken this to how humans perceive the world, where we have the ability to take incomplete information and make sense of it.
Based on their initial tests, it has shown that the use of AI can actually generate high quality images from less data than was previously thought to be required. Of course this isn’t a perfect system because sometimes pixels that have not been caught or incorrectly modeled could tell a different story, or could result in certain things being missed out, like a torn ligament or a tumor. There’s no telling when this AI will be put to actual use in the field beyond testing scenarios, but the researchers believe that its use could also be extended to other medical practices as well, such as CT scans.
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