Nuclear magnetic resonance: actualities and perspectives

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a complex physical process based on the interaction of protons in an electro­mag­ne­tic field, the most well-known and widespread ap­pli­cation in medical-clinical and medical-surgical field being nuclear magnetic resonance imaging. Considering the interdependent relationship between research in scien­ti­fic fields that are closely related to medicine and the me­di­cal world, it is particularly important to be aware of the existence of other applications of the physical process men­tioned before: diffusionometry, relaxometry and MRI spectroscopy. These are well-known and studied research entities, but their applicability in the clinical diagnostic pro­cess is still limited, despite the huge potential to provide a much broader and more detailed perspective on various biological tissues in vitro, but even in vivo. We want to re­view the evolution of nuclear magnetic resonance to­mo­gra­phy or imaging, which has gone from being a Nobel Prize-winning idea to one of the most widespread and useful methods of non-invasive and non-irradiating me­di­cal imaging, but especially an example of the feasi­bi­li­ty of diffusionometry, relaxometry, respectively MRI spec­tro­scopy in a medical setting, through global studies on their po­ten­tial diagnosis in areas such as oncology, neurology, en­do­cri­no­logy and others.