Single-cardiac-cycle phasesensitive inversion recovery (PSIR)method for cardiac MRI

Unmet Need

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is a safe, non-invasive testthat creates detailed images of organs and tissues. In a typicalMRI procedure, the subject is positioned in a strong magneticfield, and the nuclear spins in the tissue align with the field.Radio-frequency (RF) excitation pulses are directed into thetissue to excite nuclear magnetic resonances, and subsequentrelaxation of the magnetization generates signals that arereconstructed into the final image. One use of MRI is in thesetting of heart disease to visualize myocardial damage.Phase-sensitive inversion-recovery (PSIR) is a techniquecommonly used in cardiac MRI to enhance the contrastbetween normal and infarcted heart tissue while nullingsignals from blood and fat. In PSIR, two datasets are acquired,a conventional image and a reference phase dataset. Thephase information in these datasets is then compared toreconstruct the final image. These datasets are acquiredduring two consecutive heartbeats but at the same time pointin the cardiac cycle and this presents several technicalchallenges. First, spatial misregistration of the two datasetscaused by poor breath holding or free breathing results inimaging artifacts. Second, when combining PSIR withrespiratory navigation during free breathing, which is done for3D imaging, the acquisition of paired datasets takes evenlonger than two heartbeats and makes scan time so excessivethat 3D PSIR is hardly used in clinical practice. Therefore, itwould be desirable to have an improved technique thatovercomes these drawbacks and allows PSIR imaging of tissueaffected by cardiovascular pulsatile motion.

Technology

Duke researchers have developed an improved MRI methodand system that can overcome limitations associated withstandard phase-sensitive inversion recovery (PSIR) imagingand similar MR imaging techniques by collecting pairedreference and inversion recovery datasets within a shortenedtime frame. The rationale is based on the observation that theheart’s shape and location are very similar and often identicalin mid-diastole and in the beginning of each cardiac cycle.Therefore, combing data sets from these different cardiac

Duke File (IDF) #

T-005183

Inventor(s)

Jenista, ElizabethChen, Enn-LingKim, RaymondRehwald, Wolfgang

Links

From Duke CardiovascularMagnetic Resonance Center

College

School of Medicine (SOM)

For more informationplease contact

Chang Villacreses, David9196683401david.chang@duke.edu

phases results in good spatial registration. This insight allowstaking both datasets during one heartbeat and minimizesrespiration-related misregistration. In addition, the inventorshave confirmed that the spatial resolution of the referencedataset can be lowered without compromising resolution ofthe reconstructed PSIR image while further loweringacquisition time. The system has been tested on the Siemensclinical MRI scanner and shown to deliver the anticipatedsignificant reduction in misregistration artifacts. Thistechnology is only available for non-exclusive licensing.

Advantages

Dataset acquisition time is less than the one cardiaccycle durationNo artifacts resulting from misregistration errorsbetween datasetsHas been successfully tested on a Siemens clinical MRIscanner

Publications

A novel single-cardiac-cycle phase sensitive inversionrecovery (PSIR) method improves free breathing singleshot flow independent dark blood delayed enhancement(FIDDLE) (Proceedings from the 20th annual SCMRscientific sessions, 2017)Patent (10,591,568)

Patents

Patent Number: 10,591,568Title: SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR PHASE-SENSITIVEINVERSION RECOVERY MR IMAGING WITH REDUCEDSENSITIVITY TO CARDIAC MOTIONCountry: United States of America

Patent Number: 10,591,568Title: SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR PHASE-SENSITIVEINVERSION RECOVERY MR IMAGING WITH REDUCEDSENSITIVITY TO CARDIAC MOTIONCountry: United States of America