New MRI scanners, using high strength 7 Tesla magnetic fields, provide more detailed images and improve diagnoses. But before these can be used routinely they must comply with international safety standards. EMRP project Metrology for next-generation safety standards and equipment in MRI developed numerical procedures to compute radio-frequency fields throughout the patient's body, and measurement tools to check and validate these simulations. As a result, novel protocols can more accurately calculate safe exposure levels and demonstrate that these scanners are safe to use. Together with contributions to a new international IEC standard for safety verification and certification of new MRI scanners, the research has helped to establish guidelines for safe scanner design, paving the way for their adoption in clinical practice.

Diseases are becoming increasingly resistant to antibiotics, limiting treatment options. Developing new antibiotics is costly and time consuming with no guarantee of success or commercial return on the investment. EMRP project Metrology for biomolecular origin of disease established a new design tool that can cost-effectively link the molecular structure of a potential antibiotic to the desired therapeutic effect. This enables the prediction and monitoring of biological processes at the molecular and cellular level for a range of medical applications. The research has, in collaboration with the academic community, already generated a new antibiotic which can be delivered through the skin and has the potential for creating the next-generation of antibiotics.