CAPI

The Center for Advanced Preclinical Imaging (CAPI) was opened in 2016 with the support of the Czech Ministry for Education, Youth and Sport's Operational Programme Research and Development for Innovation (OP RDI), under the auspices of the 1st Faculty of Medicine of Charles University in Prague. It serves the research needs of academic and commercial research institutes from around the world, and is part of the Czech-BioImaging and EuroBioImaging consortium (see below). In addition to its own in vivo imaging, CAPI is involved in the development and testing of new imaging probes and technologies, and is dedicated to student teaching and in house research.

We are a multimodal imaging center, equipped with state-of-the-art technologies for the examination of small laboratory animals (mouse, rat) by X-ray, CT, MRI, MPI, PET, SPECT, optical fluorescence and luminescence imaging, ultrasound and photoacoustics. All these methods can be combined for the same object and results can be co-registered into single final image. Measurements can be performed on up to 4 animals simultaneously. The instruments have integrated anaesthesia units, maintenance of the animal's body temperature, and monitoring of its vital signs (ECG, respiration, blood pressure, video monitoring). In vivo imaging of laboratory animals allows the design of studies where individual animals serve themselves as controls (single-subject design). This reduces the variability of the data and the number of animals needed to perform the experiment. Animals are housed in individually ventilated cages (IVC).

Czech-BioImaging is a national research infrastructure for biological and medical imaging, focusing on medical and biological imaging. This infrastructure allows an open access to a wide range of cutting-edge imaging technologies and expertise to Czech and foreign scientists whose own laboratories and institutions do not offer it. At the same time, it promotes mutual scientific collaboration through the sharing of knowledge and best practices in the field.

EuroBioImaging is the European landmark research infrastructure for biological and biomedical imaging. It provides open access to imaging equipment, expertise, training opportunities and data management services to all scientists regardless of affiliation, area of expertise or field of activity, with high quality standards by leading imaging centers.