MRI is the best analytical method available today – fast, accurate and versatile; its only disadvantage is the high cost of equipment, which is still not enough in Poland – believes prof. Iwona Wawer from the Medical University of Warsaw.
On Wednesday, another conference was held in Warsaw as part of the nationwide Drug Safe campaign, organized by the Office for Registration of Medicinal Products, Medical Devices and Biocidal Products.
The phenomenon of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) was discovered in 1945. The samples, placed in a very strong magnetic field, preferably produced by a superconducting helium-cooled electromagnet, are exposed to radio waves and the atoms present in the samples vibrate in a characteristic, recordable manner.
Physicists were the first to get interested in NMR – said Prof. Wawer. – Later it was used in chemistry – it made it possible to identify hydrogen and carbon atoms in organic molecules, and thus to learn about the structure of a compound.
The method turned out to be very useful for pharmacists. It has been widely accepted for the identification of drugs and vaccines and for confirming their purity. NMR analysis is as accurate and precise as standard chromatography, except that no chemical treatment or standards are required. Another version of the NMR method – MAS – allows the analysis of samples, for example tablets, in the solid state.
NMR gives so much information about the composition of the sample that in the case of medical analyzes, not everything can be interpreted, despite the use of artificial intelligence methods. NMR spectra of body fluids (urine, blood plasma, serum, seminal fluid) are very complex but characteristic of the patient’s condition. With the collection of data on samples, new methods of early detection of diseases will emerge, said Prof. Wawer.
How sensitive the NMR method is, is evidenced by the studies of homeopathic medicines that are strongly shaken during the production process. During these shocks, the content of air and dissolved glass from the vessel increases in the solution.
Using the resonance signal of water, cross-sections and three-dimensional reconstructions of the human body (MRI) can be obtained, which has become a valuable tool in medical diagnostics. You can even track the presence of chemicals in the brain and its activity. Computer analysis of the location and intensity of characteristic signals in the spectrum allows for the simultaneous evaluation of many parameters and gives an image of the metabolism in the body (metabolomics).
Functional MRI scanners allow you to study brain activity, for example in people in love or people asked about matters related to religion. There have been voices to use functional MRI as a lie detector, but scientists are against it.
As noted by prof. Wawer, despite its extraordinary usefulness, is still not widely used in Poland. Equipment costing several hundred thousand euros should be found in every Polish academic center – the research itself is relatively cheap, and the benefits for patients’ health, science, economy, and even the judiciary – difficult to overestimate. We have excellent specialists in the country, which guarantees that the equipment will not be idle – said Wawer.
Among the examples of applications presented at the conference, there were, among others, the identification of suspicious preparations massively imported from China by a Polish woman (a toxic slimming agent – sibutramine) at the National Medicines Institute, or the famous Corhydron case in 2006. Prof. Wawer recalled that the batch of ampoules sold as this drug contained a very similar looking white powder – the dangerous succinylcholine. To discover this, a brief NMR analysis was enough.
To the led by prof. Wawer Zakład Chemii Fizycznej (Physical Chemistry Department) came forward with a washing powder producer – there were black grains in the phosphate granules supplied to him. As shown by the NMR study, it was rape. The carrier was tempted by additional earnings – in his spare time he was transporting rape in a tanker, and he did not feel like cleaning it after unloading. (PAP)