It was only a matter of time before the ghostly beauty of MR images were used to inspire art. British singer-songwriter Sivu has just released the first-ever music video to employ real-time MRI technology in order to capture moving images of his singing profile.
Directed by Adam Powell and made possible through the expertise of London doctors Marc E. Miquel and Andrew David Scott, the video for "Better Man Than He" is a revealing and intimate look at the movement in the singer's vocal system. To shoot the above video, Sivu sang his song repeatedly, while in the scanner, for almost three hours.
Sivu's video wasn't the only unorthodox manifestation of MRI technology this week: US military research agency Darpa has just launched FIDOS (Functional Imaging to Develop Outstanding Service-Dogs), a project which aims to streamline military dog training using MRI to scan the brains of canine candidates.
A study was published out of Emory University last year led by neuroscientist Greg Berns, in which dogs trained to remain still had their brains scans immediately after being shown hand gestures associated with food or social rewards. Darpa researchers believe that the dogs whose scans reveal greater brain activity in response to these stimuli are smarter and more socialized, and will be "faster and easier to train," than dogs whose scans show less brain activity.