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Five steps to make MRI scanners more affordable to the world

Fifty years since the basis of magnetic resonance imaging was published, MRI scanners remain expensive — and impractical in many countries. Here’s how we are making them smaller and less costly.
  1. Andrew Webb

    1. Andrew Webb is a professor of radiology and founding director of the C. J. Gorter MRI Center, Department of Radiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands.

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  2. Johnes Obungoloch

    1. Johnes Obungoloch is a senior lecturer in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Mbarara University of Science and Technology, Mbarara, Uganda.

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Peter Nsubuga, Ivan Muhumuza, Johnes Obungoloch, Ivan Etoku, Chris Mugume and Patricia Tusiime.

Johnes Obungoloch (centre) and his team with a magnet used in a low-field MRI scanner. Credit: Wouter Teeuwisse and Tom O'Reilly

In 2014, paediatric neurosurgeon Steven Schiff approached our research team with a challenge: build an easy-to-use, portable magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) system at a fraction of the cost of a conventional scanner. He needed it to image the brains of children in Uganda with hydrocephalus, a build-up of fluid in the brain.

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Nature 615, 391-393 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-00759-x

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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