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Printer FriendlyReprinted with permission from Popular Mechanics, November
1999.
© Copyright The Hearst Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Inside the chemistry of life
Directing the enormous analytic capabilities of a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) device on a single cell will give biologists their best ever look at the subtle chemistry of life. Current analytical techniques destroy or alter the cells they examine.
The MRI cellular observatory is noninvasive, so scientists can see how cells respond as their environment changes. "For the first time we have been able to do this on the cell nucleus, the internal control center of the cell," says Robert Wind of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) study team.
Studying changes in one cell the moment they occur will help doctors predict and prevent diseases.
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