  We present a highly sensitive room-temperature atomic magnetometer (AM),
designed for use in biomedical applications. The magnetometer sensor head is
only 2x2x5 cm^3 and it is constructed using readily available, low-cost optical
components. The magnetic field resolution of the AM is <10 fT/sqrt(Hz), which
is comparable to cryogenically cooled superconducting quantum interference
device (SQUID) magnetometers. We present side-by-side comparisons between our
AM and a SQUID magnetometer, and show that equally high quality
magnetoencephalography (MEG) and magnetocardiography (MCG) recordings can be
obtained using our AM.
