Scientists from the Netherlands and Russia have designed and tested a new metasurface-based technology for enhancing the local sensitivity of MRI scanners on humans for the first time. The metasurface consists of thin resonant strips arranged periodically. Placed under a patient’s head, it provided much higher signals from the local brain region. The results published in Scientific Reports, show that the use of metasurfaces can potentially reduce image acquisition time, thus improving comfort for patients, or acquire higher resolution images for better disease diagnosis.