The Journal of Medical Imaging (JMI) has launched, with freely accessible articles on new research on earlier and more accurate diagnosis and monitoring of cancer and other diseases, image quality assessment, 3D imaging, and other topics. Published by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, the quarterly journal is available online in the SPIE Digital Library, with each peer-reviewed article published as it is approved. JMI will also be issued in print.

JMI covers fundamental and translational research and applications focused on medical imaging, said Editor-in-Chief Maryellen Giger, A.N. Pritzker Professor of Radiology/Medical Physics at the University of Chicago. Advisory editors are Michael Fitzpatrick of Vanderbilt University, Harrison Barrett of the University of Arizona, and Norbert Pelc of Stanford University.

"The medical imaging community, especially attendees of the SPIE Medical Imaging conference, have repeatedly voiced the need for a peer-reviewed avenue for the research they present at the conference," Dr. Giger said in her inaugural editorial. "Having both the proceedings of the conference and now this peer-reviewed Journal of Medical Imaging will fulfill these multiple needs, as well as introduce an effective mechanism for the dissemination and archiving of scientific research and developments in medical imaging from proceedings to peer-reviewed journal."

The journal's scope spans the physics of medical imaging, tomographic reconstruction algorithms, image processing, computer-aided diagnosis, visualization and modeling, PACS and imaging informatics, image perception and observer performance, technology assessment, ultrasonic imaging, image-guided procedures, robotic interventions, digital pathology, and biomedical applications in molecular, structural, and functional imaging.

JMI will include special sections on "Pioneers in Medical Imaging," with the first one in memory of Robert F. Wagner, a distinguished imaging physicist and a founder of the SPIE Medical Imaging symposium.

Letters, book reviews, and reviews on focused topics in medical imaging as well as highlights from the annual SPIE Medical Imaging symposium will also be included.

Articles on image processing, computer-aided diagnosis, and biomedical applications in molecular, structural, and functional imaging are among the journal's first papers. Some of the articles are:

Additional papers are on topics in these areas as well as image-guided procedures, robotic interventions, and modeling; and image perception, observer performance, and technology assessment.

All online JMI articles are freely available to readers through 2015.