The joint venture will give the university access to the Pacific Radiology’s MRI facility in Great King St for about two and a-half days a week.
University researchers said the joint venture was opening up exciting possibilities for MRI-based research in several fields, including in recovery after neurological injuries, and aspects of fatty liver disease.
Pacific Radiology’s new MRI was recently officially launched, giving access to "world-class imaging research" at Otago.
Working together, the Pacific Radiology Group (PRG) bought and installed the scanner, while Otago University and Otago alumni and other donors provided more than $110,000 to buy specialised extra hardware and software to enhance its research capabilities, especially for the purpose of studying brain function.
Brain Research NZ-Rangahau Roro Aotearoa co-director Prof Cliff Abraham, of Otago University, says regular access to MRI for research has been a long-held dream at the university, but had previously not been possible given the clinical demands for scans, over the past 20 years.
This had left the university "at a severe competitive disadvantage" with other research groups overseas, he said.
Otago University had "world-class researchers" but "we could not undertake quality scanning of body organs and the brain".
This also "affected our ability to teach parts of modern science, particularly human biology and psychology," Prof Abraham said.
University deputy vice-chancellor, research and enterprise, Prof Richard Blaikie said the Dunedin and Otago community would benefit from the partnership between the university and Pacific Radiology in several ways, including through a lift in the quality of diagnosis and care the PRG will deliver.
Other benefits to health and wellbeing would also flow from the findings of university research, and further skilled and specialist staff would be employed to run both clinical and research operations at the facility.
The MRI is already being used by the University’s Dunedin Longitudinal Study to scan its cohort of study participants, in order to understand factors that influence the rate of biological and cognitive ageing.
Other studies will include brain scanning as part of a new Dementia Prevention Research Clinic, studies of neuroplasticity by neurosurgeon Prof Dirk de Ridder, as well as studies of learning, anxiety, drug addiction, emotions, stroke recovery and epilepsy. Brain Research NZ is a nationally-funded Centre of Research Excellence (CoRE) jointly led by directors at Otago and Auckland universities.