The proposed research is enormously relevant to the clinical understanding of early prostate cancer. We propose to test to see whether characteristic patterns of invivo 3T MRSI associated metabolites can be identified in correlation with clinically active tumor reserved on histopathologic analysis of resected specimens. We also plan to demonstrate that 3T MR spectra of prostate cancer will allow for more detailed metabolic assessment with higher sensitivity, specificity and accuracy and publish results established from MR spectra using 1.5T MR units. Functional imaging (eg. molecular imaging such as this) is felt to be the clinical wave of the future for cancer imaging, and if successful, will assume a very major role in the detection, assessment, treatment planning and delivery of drugs, radiation, heat and novel therapeutics in the fight against prostate cancer.
