Facebook’s AI researchers are working with New York University to make magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) up to 10 times faster.
The goal: Through a project called fastMRI, Facebook’s team will develop algorithms capable of filling in the gaps in low-resolution MRI scan, effectively turning them into higher-res ones. This could be important because currently it can take an hour or more to produce a good MRI scan. That is a long time to lie motionless inside an MRI machine, especially for children or patients who are already unwell. The hope is to cut the time down to a few minutes.
How’s it work? MRI scans will be enhanced using what’s known as a generative model. Neural networks will be trained (using anonymized data) to fill in missing or degraded part of MRI scans. Larry Zitnick, the lead Facebook researcher on the project, says the key challenge will be making sure that nothing vital is left out of the touched-up pics.
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