A YORK technology company which was hailed for its "incredible" achievements in developing the next generation of brain scanners has gone into administration.

York Instruments Ltd employed 46 people at its base at York Science Park but the administrators, Redman Nichols Butler, have declined to say whether they have been made redundant or provide any other information. A spokeswoman said the firm had a policy of not speaking to the media.

Established in 2015, York Instruments was developing the next generation of magnetoencephalography (MEG) brain scanners for the diagnosis and treatment of severe epilepsy and a range of other brain disorders.

With just 200 MEG scanners currently in use worldwide, the business - a subsidiary of Florida-based Croton Healthcare - believed that its newly developed technology would be instrumental in expanding the use of MEG technology worldwide.

On October last year, it received a ‘Business Start-Up Award’ from the Institute of Physics (IoP), given to young companies with a "great business idea founded on a physics invention, with great business growth potential and/or the potential of significant societal impact".

The York Instruments team met Julian Sturdy, then the York Outer MP, during a visit made as part of the award, and earlier this year he visited the manufacturing and testing facility, learning about its cutting-edge work into epilepsy and brain injury diagnosis, and how its technology was already helping shed light on issues like concussion in professional sports.

He said then that it was very impressive to see that as a young company, York Instruments was already trading in the US, with potential to expand into the Chinese and Japanese markets.

“For a company based in York to be leading the field and opening those market opportunities globally is incredible,” he said. “It’s fantastic to see that York, as a city, is at the forefront of that.”

Gary Green, chief technology officer of York Instruments, said then that the IoP award was a significant honour, adding: "It’s important that scientific and medical device development is given as much support as possible and we hope that it continues to be a prominent issue for the government going forward.”

Claire Bennett, general manager of York Science Park, said then it was incredibly proud of the "amazing work" York Instruments was doing to expand understanding of brain injuries. She confirmed yesterday that the firm was no longer at the park.