FIGURE 2:

Estimate of the relative component costs within a low-end conventional 1.5T scanner. Costs are estimated for high-volume commodity production (runs of ~1000 per year) and would be considerably higher for one-off, or laboratory instrumentation. Note that a low-end system with a market price of about $800,000 USD and a 4× markup over components cost suggests a total components cost of $200,000 USD leaving a cost of about $75,000 USD for the magnet and cryostat. Costs, of course, depend on the detailed specifications, and are treated as proprietary figures in the industry. Thus, these estimates are based on the authors’ intuition and not specific data.