Precursor lesions of pancreatic cancer are very difficult to characterize with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). But now, in a new study, researchers led by Noam Shemesh and Carlos Bilreiro – respectively head of the Preclinical MRI lab at Champalimaud Research and a doctor at the Champalimaud Clinical Centre’s Radiology Department – have shown, for the first time, that a particular form of MRI, called Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI), is capable of robustly detecting pre-malignant lesions in the pancreas.