A critical need exists for an on-site primate NMR imaging system at Harvard's New England Regional Primate Research Center (NERPRC) in Southborough, Massachusetts. 281 investigators from 121 universities rely on the resources of the Primate Center, with its 1,300 animals, for their research and teaching programs. Currently, all non-invasive anatomic, metabolic and functional NMR studies of these primates must be performed 30 miles off-campus in sub-standard facilities in Boston or Worcester. The distance, time constraints and inadequate resources of area NMR laboratories are especially problematic for the many unhealthy animals studied for models of human disease. These obstacles to scientific progress, human safety and animal welfare will be overcome by installing a modern, primate-dedicated NMR instrument at the NERPRC. Specifically, the community of NERPRC investigators proposes a 9.4T NMR system for primate imaging and spectroscopy to be located at the Primate Center. The 9.4T primate imager will have a Varian Associates, Inc. Inova console and a Magnex Scientific, Inc. superconducting magnet with 7 G/cM shielded gradients and high-order shims. The magnet will have a 45-cm inside diameter that will step to a gradient-coil inside diameter of 33cm, 20cm from magnet iso-center. The magnetic bore size and configuration were chosen to give sufficient room for laboratory primate research, while still making possible higher performance gradients, shims and field strength than can be achieved with larger human-sized magnets. With four receiver channels and two transmitter channels, this system will be capable of multi-nuclear spectroscopy from 12 MHz to 400 MHz with full second-channel decoupling capability. The echo-planar imaging (EPI) compatible gradients will make it possible to perform dynamic fMRI studies. Signal-to-noise and spectroscopic resolution at 9.4 T has been demonstrated to be twice that of standard 4.7T animal research systems. The proposed system, as specified, will perform 50- micron resolution anatomic imaging, for sub-millimeter slice thicknesses, in localized regions of interest. Overall, this primate dedicated NMR system will provide state-of-the-art performance and capability for imaging of laboratory animals at the NERPRC.
