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For Victoriahope McCauliffe, the seizures started when she was four, and haven't stopped.

"I feel like I am not living like a normal teenager,” McCauliffe said.

"I have like scars from where I've fallen down and crawled on the ground and I've been in school where I've been all bloody,” McCauliffe said.

Growing up with epilepsy isn't easy. Medication doesn't always work and it makes her groggy. Surgery is an option, if doctors know where to operate.

"Many patients with epilepsy could be helped if we could find the part of the brain that's actually the source of the epilepsy, but in many patients those parts of the brain are so small we just can't see them with our normal MRI,” Professor Radiology and Health Sciences & Technology Bruce Rosen said.

Rosen is one of the first to use the brain bucket, a new scanner that sees inside the brain like never before.

"It's kind of like the difference between the picture you would take on your cell phone and the picture you would take with a good 10-megapixel camera,” Rosen said.

The helmet is filled with 96 metal coils and sensors that pick up signals from different areas of the brain and translate them into an image. A traditional MRI uses between two and 12 coils.

"With the brain bucket technology, we kind of put the whole process on steroids,” Rosen said.

Doctors believe the device could also be a powerful weapon in the fight against Alzheimer's and brain tumors. With its resolution, the device can identify and follow changes in the brain, allowing doctors to prescribe more accurate treatments. 

The brain bucket’s picture is clearer than an MRI. It showed a small lesion that's causing seizures. In a study the device caught 50 percent more defects than traditional scans. McCauliffe said the helmet sees what others have missed so she can have surgery to stop the seizures.

Doctors believe the device could also be a powerful weapon in the fight against Alzheimer's and brain tumors. With its resolution, the device can identify and follow changes in the brain, allowing doctors to prescribe more accurate treatments.