The industrial chair held by Institut Fresnel and CRMBM-CEMEREM with start-up Multiwave Imaging is the fruit of a collaboration begun in 2016 between the two research units of the Institut Carnot STAR, with the aim of improving Magnetic Resonance Medical Imaging (MRI).
Set up at the beginning of the year via Aix-Marseille University's A*Midex foundation, this chair is already showing promising results, with two patents filed.
In 2015, the Institut Carnot STAR decided to fund the initial work coming out of the Institut Fresnel, then in collaboration with CEA Neurospin. This work validated the original concept, namely the use of metamaterials (periodically structured artificial media) to manufacture antennas that improve the resolution of very high-field MRI images.
The proof of concept was thus validated (and patented), and led to a rapid transfer to the Swiss company Multiwave Technologies, with the creation of an entity in Marseille (Multiwave Imaging). The story then accelerated, with the award of major European funding in 2016 leading to the M-CUBE project, launched in 2017, with a consortium of eight academic partners and two companies, including Multiwave Technologies.
"This wonderful story, initiated by the financing of an original proof-of-concept by our Institute, has led to industrial activity in Marseille, and has also generated major scientific activity.
This is emblematic of our missions: providing scientific expertise to industry to generate innovation is Carnot's very DNA", says
Serge Monneret, Director of Carnot STAR.
Four years of activity around M-CUBE have produced more than satisfactory results. As Redha Abdeddaim (lecturer-researcher, AMU - Institut Fresnel) and Stefan Enoch (CNRS Research Director - Institut Fresnel), both of whom were behind the initial concept, emphasize: "We're very proud of the results we've achieved, particularly those that are now being used in clinical protocols for the early diagnosis of certain diseases, but also to improve the quality of ultra-high-field MRI".
For this reason, the European Union has continued its support in the form of the current M-One project, with the ambition of transforming the technologies developed within M-CUBE into tangible medical devices that will become the benchmark for ultra-high-field MRI, capable of providing a more easily readable image of the brain, without impacting on either operating time or patient comfort. It's a project that will help French MRI expertise shine on the world stage.
It's therefore only logical that the collaboration between the Institut Fresnel, the CRMBM and start-up Multiwave Imaging should be the subject of an industrial chair co-financed by the A*Midex foundation, which will enable the product to move from invention to innovation through industrialization.