Stone to Silicon

Health & biology · 1973

Magnetic resonance imaging

Nuclear magnetic resonance became an image, showing soft tissue with no ionising radiation.

Paul Lauterbur published the first MRI image in 1973 and Peter Mansfield developed fast imaging; the first full human body scan followed in 1977. MRI excels at imaging brain, spine and joints.

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What it built on 3

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Related measurements

The dashed line marks when it first worked.

Life expectancy in the UK since 1543 Latest: 81.3 years (2023) Source: Our World in Data