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On modeling
Author(s) -
Novikov Dmitry S.,
Kiselev Valerij G.,
Jespersen Sune N.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
magnetic resonance in medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.696
H-Index - 225
eISSN - 1522-2594
pISSN - 0740-3194
DOI - 10.1002/mrm.27101
Subject(s) - focus (optics) , realm , computer science , bridge (graph theory) , diffusion mri , data science , translation (biology) , engineering ethics , cognitive science , neuroscience , psychology , magnetic resonance imaging , medicine , biology , political science , radiology , physics , anatomy , biochemistry , messenger rna , law , optics , gene , engineering
Mapping tissue microstructure with MRI holds great promise as a noninvasive window into tissue organization at the cellular level. Having originated within the realm of diffusion NMR in the late 1970s, this field is experiencing an exponential growth in the number of publications. At the same time, model‐based approaches are also increasingly incorporated into advanced MRI acquisition and reconstruction techniques. However, after about two decades of intellectual and financial investment, microstructural mapping has yet to find a single commonly accepted clinical application. Here, we suggest that slow progress in clinical translation may signify unresolved fundamental problems. We outline such problems and related practical pitfalls, as well as review strategies for developing and validating tissue microstructure models, to provoke a discussion on how to bridge the gap between our scientific aspirations and the clinical reality. We argue for recalibrating the efforts of our community toward a more systematic focus on fundamental research aimed at identifying relevant degrees of freedom affecting the measured MR signal. Such a focus is essential for realizing the truly revolutionary potential of noninvasive three‐dimensional in vivo microstructural mapping.