Industrial and scientific objectives

In November 2019, the University Hospital of Poitiers hosted an ultra-high-field 7 Tesla MRI, providing access to molecular and metabolic imaging with very high resolution, enabling unparalleled measurement of organ structure and function. This imaging technology promises major advances in the non-invasive, in vivo study of numerous pathologies, their clinical management, and the real-time monitoring of their progression under treatment, potentially after surgery. Indeed, pathological processes such as cancers and chronic diseases generally induce, or result from, gene alterations and changes in cell metabolism, which can be studied in detail with these new devices. The CE marking, unique in France for this device, allows for genuine translational research and opens the door to major clinical applications, such as the development of a “virtual biopsy” within a predictive approach stemming from research.

The objective is to implement innovative Artificial Intelligence techniques for the automatic processing and analysis of multi-modality images, to aid in diagnosis and therapeutic monitoring in pathologies:

• of the brain (neuro-oncology, psychiatry, studies of neurodegenerative diseases, research in cognitive sciences, pharmacology with studies of the central diffusion of antibiotics by intracerebral micro-dialysis);
• of the heart (cardiovascular accidents and diseases);
• kidney (study of the graft before removal, follow-up of the graft in the transplant recipient).