 Rabi died at his home on Riverside Drive , Manhattan , from cancer on 11 January 1988 . He was survived by his wife , Helen , who died at the age of 102 on 18 June 2005 . In his last days , he was reminded of his greatest achievement when his physicians examined him using magnetic resonance imaging , a technology that had been developed from his ground @-@ breaking research on magnetic resonance . The machine happened to have a reflective inner surface , and he remarked : " I saw myself in that machine ... I never thought my work would come to this . " 
