Consumer >> CEO Interviews >> February 9, 2004
LEON KAUFMAN is currently acting as Head of Research at AccuImage
Diagnostics Corporation as well as consulting in the medical imaging
field. He received a BS degree in Engineering Physics and a PhD in
Physics from the University of California, Berkeley, and is Professor
Emeritus of Physics, University of California at San Francisco, where he
spent 24 years in the Radiology Department and in the Nuclear Medicine
Section. In this field he developed a number of advanced counting and
imaging devices incorporating gas-filled wire chambers and room
temperature and cryogenic semiconductor detectors. He initiated the UCSF
MRI program in 1975, a program that was supported successively by
Pfizer, Diasonics and Toshiba. Under his direction three trend setting
products were developed: the mid-field MT/S, the first whole body
superconducting MRI system to receive FDA approval, and the first
practical unit because it incorporated multislice and spin echo imaging;
Access, the first commercial open MRI, operating at an ultra-low field;
and, OPART, the first mid-field, superconducting, cryogenless open MRI,
a unit that has defined the future standards for open MRI. Dr. Kaufman
spent six years at Toshiba as Chief Scientist and Vice President of
Engineering. Following this he spent two years as Chief Executive
Officer at AccuImage Diagnostics Corporation and President of
International MRI Accreditation Resources, LLC. He has over 400
publications and holds 40 MRI and image processing patents with 20
others filed. Profile
and a picture of the things you're doing at the present time?
Dr. Kaufman: The company was started basically to service
