- Campbell Arnold
- Jun 24
- 4 min read
“Whole-body MRI & traditional single-cancer screening methods may synergistically enhance our ability to detect disease early.”
— Yosef Chodakiewitz, Medical Director at Prenuvo
Welcome to RadAccess: Impressions—your quick-read companion to the main RadAccess newsletter. Like a radiology report's impressions section, we only deliver the essential information to respect your time. For more details, you can always turn to the full RadAccess newsletter.
In this issue, we cover:
Double the Contrast—Not the Dose
Low-Field MRI Gears Up for Big-League Neuroscience
Early Insights from Prenuvo's Whole-Body MRI for Cancer Screening Study
Positrigo raises $8.5M for ultra compact brain-only PET scanner
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Double the Contrast—Not the Dose
This week, I’m excited to highlight one of my own preprints: the clinical validation study for AiMIFY, a deep-learning algorithm developed by Subtle Medical and Bracco Imaging to enhance lesion conspicuity without increasing gadolinium dose in brain MRI. Here is an overview:
The validation was a multi-center multi-reader study with 110 patients
Standard-of-care and AiMIFY-enhanced images were rated by neuroradiologists and analyzed quantitatively
AiMIFY showed significant improvements in lesion contrast, internal morphology, border delineation, and overall image quality.
In an physics-based analysis, the contrast gains were on par with double-dose studies, offering a significant contrast benefit with no additional dose
As lead author Srivathsa Pasumarthi put it, AiMIFY could help radiologists identify subtle but critical findings, such as new mutliple sclerosis lesions or brain metastases—potentially changing lives without increasing a patient's contrast exposure.
Low-Field MRI Gears Up for Big-League Neuroscience
Low-field MRI is rapidly developing—not only as a tool for expanding clinical access, but as a viable platform for global neuroscience research. Two recent studies highlight the potential of Hyperfine’s 64mT portable MRI system to support advanced brain imaging at scale. A UK-led arXiv preprint demonstrated that diffusion tractography, typically limited to high-field systems, can be performed on Hyperfine scanners. The proposed protocol was under and hour and the authors showed strong agreement in diffusion metrics. Meanwhile, the UNITY project published a quality control framework in Human Brain Mapping validating consistent performance across 17 sites in 12 countries, using phantoms from CaliberMRI to ensure reproducibility in varied environments. Together, these studies mark an exciting step toward large-scale, globally distributed neuroscience research—powered by portable, accessible MRI.
Early Insights from Prenuvo's Whole-Body MRI for Cancer Screening Study
Could whole-body MRI become a viable tool for early cancer detection? Preliminary results from Prenuvo’s Polaris study suggest it just might. This retrospective analysis included 1,011 individuals who underwent non-contrast, whole-body MRI with diffusion-weighted imaging, with outcomes assessed via follow-up phone calls. Key findings include:
A 2.2% cancer detection rate, based on 41 biopsies—just over half confirming new malignancies.
86% of detected cancers occurred in patients with no reported symptoms.
68% of cancers were found in areas not covered by standard screening guidelines.
While limited by its retrospective design and reliance on self-reported outcomes, the study offers early evidence that whole-body MRI may help identify cancers missed by conventional screening. While the jury is still out on the efficacy of whole-body screening, many are clearly eager to review forthcoming studies—especially Prenuvo’s larger 100,000-person Hercules study.
Positrigo raises $8.5M for ultra compact brain-only PET scanner
Positrigo, a spin-off from ETH Zurich, has raised $8.5M to advance its ultra-compact brain-only PET scanner, NeuroLF, following FDA and EU clearance. The company is focusing in on Alzheimer’s disease—where amyloid and tau PET imaging is becoming increasingly important. Positrigo aims to offer a more accessible alternative to traditional PET systems, which are often costly and infrastructure-heavy. NeuroLF’s smaller footprint could make it ideal for outpatient settings like memory clinics and community hospitals, expanding access to PET imaging beyond tertiary medical centers. This funding round, led by HealthCap and Navivo, will support commercial scaling in North America and Europe—marking a key step toward broader access to functional brain imaging as global dementia rates continue to climb.
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References
Pasumarthi, Srivathsa, et al. "Deep-Learning Based Contrast Boosting Improves Lesion Visualization and Image Quality: A Multi-Center Multi-Reader Study on Clinical Performance with Standard Contrast Enhanced MRI of Brain Tumors." medRxiv (2025): 2025-06.
Gholam, James, et al. "Diffusion Tensor MRI and Spherical-Deconvolution-Based Tractography on an Ultra-Low Field Portable MRI System." arXiv preprint arXiv:2506.04473 (2025).
Ljungberg, Emil, et al. "Characterization of portable ultra‐low field MRI scanners for multi‐center structural neuroimaging." Human Brain Mapping 46.8 (2025): e70217.
https://www.positrigo.com/positrigo-closes-financing-round-and-appoints-new-board-members/
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