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1 NMR/MRI Research Facilities
2 Hyperpolarized Resources
3 Optical Resources
4 Oversight/Regulatory
5 Associated Centers and Laboratories
6 Miscellaneous Facilities
7 Computing Equipment
8 Internal Resources

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NMR/MRI Research Facilities

The primary instrument of the Resource is a 7 Tesla whole-body Siemens MRI scanner dedicated to 100% multi-nuclear MRI research. The system is capable of performing imaging and spectroscopy studies on a variety of NMR visible nuclei, including ¹H, ³¹P, ¹³C, ²³Na, ¹⁹F, ¹⁷O, ⁷Li, ¹⁴N, ¹⁵N, ¹²⁹Xe, and ³He. The pulse-programming environment allows for development of sophisticated pulse sequences. Sequences performed at the Resource have included T_1ρ MRI, Sodium MRI, multiple quantum spectroscopy and imaging, MR elastography, localized spectroscopy, and perfusion imaging.

Additionally, a 1.5 Tesla Siemens Sonata and two 3 Tesla Siemens Trio clinical scanners are available in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. These systems have integrated body RF coils in addition to quadrature head coils, with gradient coils capable of imaging at 40 mT / m with slew rates in excess of 200 T / m / s. Echo-planar imaging, diffusion imaging, angiography, spectroscopy, and spectroscopic imaging are standard on these systems. The center also has a 9.4 T / 20 cm bore and a 4.7 T / 12 cm horizontal bore systems and a 9.4 T / 8 cm vertical-bore system used primarily for animal and ex vivo sample imaging.

The Biomedical High Resolution NMR facility is equipped with AM500 Bruker, WH 360 Bruker and AMX 300 Bruker MR spectrometers equipped with gradient coils for high resolution imaging of mice and rats. The AMX 300 and AM500 are fiber optically linked together for fast data transfer. The facility also has a Sun Workstation for data processing. Full-time personnel are available to users of this facility.

1.5T Siemens Sonata whole-body clinical scanner

3T Siemens Trio whole-body clinical scanner

3T Siemens TIM Trio

4.7T Varian small-bore MRI system

7.0T Siemens Whole-body research scanner

7.1T Bruker AMX-300 Spectrometer

9.4T Varian vertical small-bore MRI system

9.4T Varian horizontal small-bore MRI system

11.8T Bruker AMX-500 Spectrometer

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Hyperpolarized Resources

The Resource has created a laser facility for producing hyperpolarized noble gases, and imaging and spectroscopic measurements of hyperpolarized 3He and 129Xe have been performed in vivo.

GE Healthcare optical pumping 3He polarizers (x2)
- These devices are capable of producing up to 1.2 liters of 30 – 35% polarized 3He gas in approximately 10 hours. 3He has been successfully used for regional structural and functional imaging of upper and lower airways in animals, as well as humans. 3He is however an inert gas and does not take part in any chemical or metabolic process, and therefore its application is limited to the abovementioned studies.
Home-built optical pumping 3He polarizers (x2)
- These devices are capable of producing up to 1.5 liters of 45 – 55% polarized 3He gas in approximately 12 hours. 3He has been successfully used for regional structural and functional imaging of upper and lower airways in animals, as well as humans. 3He is however an inert gas and does not take part in any chemical or metabolic process, and therefore its application is limited to the abovementioned studies.
GE Healthcare parahydrogen-induced 13C polarizer
- This device is capable of producing 5 – 15 ml of 40 – 50% polarized 13C in approximately 3 minutes. 13C has applications as contrast agents in in vivo MRI imaging in small animals. Toxicity of certain 13C compounds limits its use.
Home-built parahydrogen-induced 13C polarizer
- This device is capable of producing 4 – 10 ml of 40 – 50% polarized 13C in approximately 30 seconds. 13C has applications as contrast agents in in vivo MRI imaging in small animals. Toxicity of certain 13C compounds limits its use.
Parahydrogen Production System
- In addition to the two listed parahydrogen 13C polarizers, our hyperpolarized 13C facility includes a cryogenic parahydrogen generator and an ortho/parahydrogen measurement device. The devices are capable of polarizing suitable 13C compounds through parahydrogen-induced polarization transfer technique with substrates such as hydroxyethyl acrylate. We have successfully achieved polarization levels as high as ~90% in the ‘para’ state.
Oxford Instruments Hypersense System
- This device is capable of polarizing a large assortment of biologically friendly molecules, including pyruvate, with a range of polarization (5 – 18%) depending on the compound. This device is limited by the sample cup size, magnetic field strength making it suitable for small animal experiments.
Home-built optical pumping 129Xe polarizer
- This device is capable of producing 20 ml/min nearly 10% polarized 129Xe gas almost continuously. 129Xe has been used for regional functional imaging of lower airways in animals.This capability can be easily extended to humans by increasing the production rate of this polarizer. 129Xe is however an inert gas and does not participate in any chemical or metabolic process in the body. Limited spectroscopic information is available from hyperpolarized 129Xe, which used for in vitro studies can elucidate certain aspects of lung function, but it is not generally applicable to metabolic processes or other organs.

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Optical Resources

Diffuse Optical/Correlation Tomography Instrument (Adult Brain)
- There are two identical (in functionality) instruments.Three laser diodes and drivers (675, 785, 830nm) with coupling optics and fibers are used as sources and the sources are further coupled to a series of fast, optical switches (two 1x4 prism switches, DiCoN). Furthermore, a high coherence length, external cavity laser (780nm) from Crysta Laser with a stable laser driver, optical isolator and coupling optics is also used. Two high sensitivity, fast avalanche photo diodes (APDs) and two large sensor area photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) all from Hammamatsu and eight high sensitivity, fast, photon counting APDs (Perkin-Elmer) are used as detectors. Extensive radio-frequency (RF) electronics (RF oscillators, I/Q demodulators, electronic attenuators, amplifiers, shielded cables) from Mini-Circuits are used to encode/decode signals. A custom-build (Correlator.Com) eight channel, multi-tau, correlator board is used to calculate auto-correlation functions of detected photons. Two A/D boards and two DIO boards (National Instruments) housed in a rack-mounted personal computer are used to control the instrument and record the data. A 20” LCD screen displays the data and interface (Dell). Variety of custom-build probes housing series of fiber-optics are used with the instrument to couple the instrument to adult head. The portable instrument is housed on a 19” rack-mount, medical instrumentation cart
Diffuse Optical/Correlation Tomography Instrument (Rat Brain)
- Five laser diodes and drivers (675, 785, 830, 915 nm) with coupling optics and fibers are used as sources and the sources are further coupled to a series of fast, optical switches (one 1x16 and one 1x8 prism switches, DiCoN). A high coherence, high power, diode-pumped, diode laser (SDL) working at 800nm is also used with an optical isolator, portable, stabilized optical bread-board and coupling optics. Eight high sensitivity, fast avalanche photo diodes (APDs) from Hammamatsu and nine high sensitivity, fast, photon counting APDs (Perkin-Elmer) are used as detectors. Extensive radio-frequency (RF) electronics (RF oscillators, I/Q demodulators, electronic attenuators, amplifiers, shielded cables) from Mini-Circuits are used to encode/decode signals. A custom-build (Correlator.Com) nine channel, multi-tau, correlator board is used to calculate auto-correlation functions of detected photons. Two personal computers are used to control the instrument and acquire data. Each has two A/D boards and two DIO boards (National Instruments) to interface with the instrument. The interface and data are displayed on two 14” LCD screens. A custom-build fiber-optics probe (FiberOptic Systems) with a large number of fiber-optics are held in a grid coupled to the back of a modified SLR camera (FM2N, Nikon) is used to relay the light to and from the tissue. The instrument is portable on a custom-build rack mount set-up secured on an instrumentation cart.
Laser Speckle/Optical Intrinsic Imaging Instrument
- The source part consists of a collimated, laser diode (Hitachi, HL 785 1G, 785nm, 50mW, Thorlabs) driven by a custom-made driver and coupled to collimating/focusing optics and a white light, arc-lamp source (Oriel) coupled to optics and a fast, computer controlled filter-wheel (ASI) with a selection of filters between 400-650nm wavelength range. The data is acquired by a 12-Bit, TEC cooled CCD camera (QImaging, Retiga 1350EX) using imaging software (StreamPix, NorPix) coupled to a 60-mm lens (AF Micro-Nikkor 60mm f/2.8D, Nikon). Two personal computers (Dell) running in parallel are used to store the data and trigger various components. For triggering and high-precision timing an A/D board (DataWave Technologies) is used. The data is stored on a fast RAID array (320Gb) of hard drives working in parallel. The data and control interface is displayed on two 20” LCD screens (Dell).
Board Assembly Laboratory
- The Penn HEP Engineering Group board assembly and test lab is a 400 square foot facility with state of the art tools for prototype board assembly and repair. The lab includes IR desoldering tools, robotic solder paste application tools, optical examination systems, and soldering ovens. This facility is capable of assembling or replacing fine pitch ball grid array and chip scale packages as well as the older TQFP and SOIC devices.
System Test Laboratories
- The Group also has to several electronics system testing laboratories available for use in verifying operation of advanced electronics. Tools include oscilloscopes (up to 1 GHz bandwidth), pulsers up to 300 MHz repetition rate and sub ns rise time, pattern generators, signal generators, power supplies, temperature and voltage measuring and logging systems, and a variety of VME based custom data acquisition systems. The Group also has an eighty pin, 400 MHz, Integrated Measurement Systems (IMS) model MSTS mixed analog/digital integrated circuit tester. The IMS tester is unlikely to be necessary for this work, but is a way to get a fast, extremely programmable pattern generator and logic analyzer attached to a recalcitrant system.

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Oversight/Regulatory

Oversight of the whole-body and animal MRI scanners is provided by the Center for Advanced Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Spectroscopy (CAMRIS) , located within the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and staffed with MRI technologists skilled in imaging research protocols. In addition to these research personnel, an on-call Radiologist is available and the scanners are equipped with full physiological monitoring capabilities, crash carts, and are accessible to Hospital code teams. An on-site engineer is available to maintain the scanners in the event of technical malfunction.

Animal care at the University of Pennsylvania is maintained by a fully licensed, NIH approved University Laboratory Animal Resource (ULAR) Center. Facilities provided by ULAR include boarding, routine inspection for disease, treatment, surgical facilities, and assistance from veterinarians. This facility is fully accredited by AAALAC, demonstrating compliance with NIH Guidelines. The University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) approves all protocols for animal use. In addition to the Animal Resource Center facilities, a surgery room equipped with complete surgical facilities and monitoring equipment is available. Equipment, such as cell perfusion apparatus, anesthesia equipment, animal respirator and ventilator, EKG, transducers and hemodynamic monitors are available.

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Associated Centers and Laboratories

The Center for Functional Neuroimaging(CfN) provides support for functional neuroimaging research at the University of Pennsylvania. In addition to providing administrative support for initiatives in development, education and training, the CfN advances technical capabilities for functional neuroimaging and provides technical support for functional neuroimaging users through committees and mailing lists, comprised of members with specific expertise, and one-on-one office hour appointments with CfN faculty.

The The Laboratory for Molecular Imaging fosters synergistic and symbiotic collaborations between tumor biologists and the imaging community. The Laboratory of Molecular Imaging provides tumor biologists with noninvasive tools to examine the molecular, metabolic and physiological characteristics of cancer, as well as probes for the diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of the disease. The interactions with molecular biologists will stimulate the development of improved methods for the study and clinical management of cancer.

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Miscellaneous Facilities

A well-equipped RF laboratory with computer controlled network analyzers is available for design, construction and testing of custom RF coils.

A fully equipped machine shop is available for fabrication and repair of devices for MR research including phantoms, probes, coils, animal positioning devices, perfusion apparatus, etc.

A fully equipped animal surgery room, an analytical biochemistry laboratory, tissue culture laboratory, and a synthetic organic chemistry laboratory are available for use.

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