Robert Turner (scientist)
| Robert Turner | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1946 Northamptonshire, England |
| Residence | Leipzig, Germany |
| Nationality | British |
| Fields | Imaging neuroscience, Physics, MRI technology, Social Anthropology, Neuroanthropology |
| Institutions | Max Planck Institute (professor, director) |
| Notable awards | Simon Fraser University Outstanding Achievement Award 2009, Thorsten Almen Prize 1995 (University of Munich), Wellcome Principal Research Fellow and Professor, International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine Fellow |
Robert Turner is a director at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany, and is an internationally recognized expert in brain physics and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Coils inside every MRI scanner owe their shape to his ideas.
Robert Turner is the son of British cultural anthropologist Victor Turner and Edith Turner, and brother of poet Frederick Turner. He was born in Northamptonshire, England. He lived for several years in Zambia before returning to England, completing his secondary education at Manchester Grammar School.
He studied mathematics and physics at Cornell University, NY, USA, from 1964–1968, graduating with a BA magna cum laude. He then went on to study physics at Simon Fraser University, BC, Canada, and was awarded a PhD in 1973. For his PhD thesis, he invented and used a novel technique to measure the velocity of sound in molten metal alloys. He also completed a Post-graduate Diploma in Social Anthropology at University College London between 1975 and 1977, and conducted field ethnographic research resulting in several publications.
Since 2006, Turner has been the director of the Department of Neurophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany.
Robert Turner is among a group of pioneering physicists who helped create magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), which today is the most widely used method of brain mapping. In the 1980s, he worked with distinguished scientists including 2003 Nobel Prize winner Sir Peter Mansfield to produce a mathematical framework for MRI coil design which was crucial to the development of ultra-fast echoplanar imaging (EPI). This technique allows the recording of changes in blood flow in the brain associated with brain function and was crucial to the development of fMRI.
...
Wikipedia