Over the past two decades, magnetic resonance imaging has generated a vast revolution in biomedical research and medical diagnostics. More recently, ‘in vivo’ studies of the human brain have been expanded by novel ways of observing the areas of the human cortex activated by stimuli. The enormous interest in expanding brain investigation is emphasising the search for new NMR methods capable of extracting information on hitherto obscure aspects of brain function. Indeed, perfusion imaging, diffusion tensor imaging and other approaches have been proposed to complement the information obtained from BOLD fMRI. In the school, extensive emphasis will be placed on new openings arising from the combination of fMRI and EEG. The acquisition of simultaneous information provided by the different techniques is bound to generate important developments in the near future. The aim is also to introduce, in a comparative manner, all the main existing NMR tools for investigating brain functions. At the same time, the presentation of new NMR potentials will create a stimulating basis for discussion and learning.