Kyrre Emblem's research group: MRI Research & Technology

Kyrre EmblemGroup leader
Kyrre Emblem
Group leader

One of the major challenges in the treatment of diseases like cancer is that we do not know who will benefit from a particular drug. Since only about half the cancer patients who receive a typical anti-cancer drug benefit and the others just suffer side effects, knowing whether or not a patient's tumor is responding to a drug can bring us one step closer to truly personalized medicine – tailoring therapies to the patients who will benefit and not wasting time and resources on treatments that will be ineffective.

For many diseases, promising new treatment options may turn traditional diagnostic biomarkers insufficient because new drug mechanisms produce different imaging responses. The goal of our research is to find predictive and prognostic imaging-based biomarkers for better identification of judicious, patient-specific treatments and by this help to move the field of medicine forward. The main focus of the research group is the development, implementation and processing of advanced MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) to uncover new structural or functional information of disease. This may include tissue perfusion, diffusion, mechanical forces and subsequent changes in vascular and morphologic structure. Our work includes use of artificial intelligence and neural networks.

Active externally funded projects

  • South-Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority Grant 2021031 (2023-2026)
    INDIRECT: Imaging drug delivery in brain cancer by the intrathecal route
  • The Research Council of Norway and The Norwegian Cancer Society Research Grant 328827 (2022-2030)
    MATRIX: Multimodal Approach Targeting treatment Refractory Cancers usIng neXt generation technology (Co-lead Work Package 1)
  • Horizon TMA Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship Grant 101068340 (2023-2026)
    GLIOBID: Guiding glioblastoma treatments by decrypting tumor biomechanics via Magnetic Resonance Elastography
  • The Research Council of Norway Project for Scientific Renewal Grant 325971 (2022-2026)
    TrackGrowth: Tracking cancer growth by intelligent displacement biomaps
  • The Research Council of Norway BEHANDLING Grant 303249 and the Norwegian Cancer Society (2020-2024)
    IMAGINE: Imaging molecular mechanisms of angiogenesis in glioma-associated neovasculature
  • South-Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority Grant 2021057 (2021-2024)
    CHRONOS: Predicting glioma tumor progression and their relationship with proliferation, […]
  • European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant 758657 (2018-2023)
    ImPRESS - Imaging Perfusion Restrictions Extracellular Solid Stress
  • South-Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority Extended Career Grant 2017073 (2017-2023)
    FORCE - Functional imaging Of vascular Restrictions in CancEr

Major international collaborations:

  • Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
  • Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, USA
  • University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, USA
  • University Medical Center in Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
  • Heidelberg University, Mannheim, Germany
  • King`s College London, UK
  • Institute Curie Research Center, Paris, France
  • Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, Valencia, Spain