Rui Shen¹, Huiyu Qiao¹, Zihan Ning¹, Dongye Li², Dandan Yang¹, and Xihai Zhao^1
1Center for Biomedical Imaging Research, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, ²Department of Radiology, Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hospital, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China

We investigated the relationship between the TAWSS and presence of plaque components in histology combined with plaque burden metrics interpreted from multi-contrast MR images among patients scheduled for CEA within one week. Based on 18 patients with 60-slice histological and MR images, correlation analysis revealed that there is an association between the presence of IPH and TAWSS. In addition, our findings indicated that TAWSS can improve the performance of plaque burden metrics, MWT in predicting presence of IPH.

Irvin Teh¹, Samo Lasič^2,3, Henrik Lundell³, Beata Wereszczyńska¹, Matthew Budde⁴, Erica Dall'Armellina¹, Nadira Yuldasheva¹, Filip Szczepankiewicz^5,6,7, and Jürgen E. Schneider^1
1Leeds Institute of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine, University of Leeds, Leeds, United Kingdom, ²Random Walk Imaging, Lund, Sweden, ³Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance, Centre for Functional and Diagnostic Imaging and Research, Copenhagen University Hospital Hvidovre, Copenhagen, Denmark, ⁴Department of Neurosurgery, Neurobiology, and Anatomy, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI, United States, ⁵Clinical Sciences, Lund University, Lund, Sweden, ⁶Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States, ⁷Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA, United States

Multidimensional diffusion MRI, specifically, tensor-valued encoding is a promising technique for improving specificity in microstructural measurements in the myocardium beyond that achievable with DTI. Tensor-valued encoding data combining linear and spherical tensor encoding were acquired in ex vivo mouse hearts at 7T, including an isoproterenol-induced model of hypertrophy. Covariance and gamma fitting methods were employed to reconstruct parameter maps reflecting the isotropic and anisotropic components of the diffusion signal kurtosis. The results were consistent across both methods, and highlight the potential of multidimensional diffusion MRI for improving specificity in cardiac diffusion MRI.

Evin Ina Papalini¹, Christian Polte², and Kerstin Magdalena Lagerstrand^1
1Institute of Clinical Sciences, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden, Gothenburg, Sweden, ²Institute of Medicine, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden, Gothenburg, Sweden

Myocarditis is a common inflammatory disease in the myocardium, associated with acute heart failure, chronic dilated cardiomyopathy and sudden cardiac death. Current clinical diagnosis is based on magnetic resonance imaging, including administration of gadolinium-based contrast agents. We propose that conventional balanced steady-state-free-precession magnetic resonance imaging images reveals quantitative diagnostic features based on texture analysis. Our results showed that the texture features, in specific Variance, Gradient Mean and Sum Average, were able to significantly separate patients with and without myocarditis using conventional balanced steady-state-free-precession magnetic resonance imaging images.

Yi Li¹, Jiri Mares¹, and Timo Liimatainen^1
1Research Unit of Medical Imaging, Physics and Technology, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland

We applied Relaxation along Fictitious Field with rank n (RAFFn) to clinical 3T scanner to study RAFFn contrast between cardiac skeleton and myocardium with multiple RAFFn refocusing times i.e. pulse durations in ex vivo porcine hearts. We found the relationship between relaxation times and RAFFn pulse duration in both cardiac skeleton and myocardium. Furthermore, the optimal pulse duration to gain maximum contrast was close to 2.5 ms. RAFF2 and T₂ maps demonstrated higher contrast between cardiac skeleton and myocardium tissues when compared to T₁ and T_1ρ.

Alexander James Wilson¹, Kevin M Moulin², Gregory B Sands³, and Daniel B Ennis^2
1Radiology, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, United States, ²Radiology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States, ³Auckland Bioengineering Institute, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

Aiming to improve noninvasive assessment of tissue microstructure, a physics-based simulation of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) was used to compare helix angles between DTI and structure tensor (ST) analyses of a confocal myocardial image stack. Rodent myocardium was imaged using extended volume confocal microscopy producing a high-resolution image volume, which was segmented into intracellular and extracellular compartments. The image volume was divided into voxel-blocks, which served as the DTI simulation voxels. The DTI acquisition showed good agreement with both the ST and manually measured helix angles.  This proof-of-concept work demonstrates the feasibility of direct comparison of confocal images with DTI.

Jiahao Li^1,2, Hannah Mitlak³, Lakshmi Nambiar³, Romina Tafreshi³, Jiwon Kim³, Yi Wang^1,2, Jonathan W. Weinsaft³, and Pascal Spincemaille^2
1Biomedical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, United States, ²Radiology, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, United States, ³Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, United States

Mitral annulus calcification is common in patients with mitral regurgitation and impacts prognosis and response to mitral valve interventions. While cardiac MRI is widely used to assess MR, identification of MAC is a key gap in current cardiac MRI. Quantitative susceptibility mapping is an emerging MRI tissue characterization approach that is sensitive to calcium because it is strongly diamagnetic. Here, we demonstrate the feasibility of using cardiac QSM for detecting MAC in patients using Computed Tomography and Echocardiography as reference.

Christian T Stoeck¹, Constantin von Deuster¹, Maximilian Fuetterer¹, Malgorzata Polacin^1,2, Conny F Waschkies¹, Robbert JH van Gorkum¹, Mareike Kron³, Thea Fleischmann³, Nikola Cesarovic^3,4, Miriam Weisskopf³, and Sebastian Kozerke^1
1Institute for Biomedical Engineering, University and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland, ²Institute of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland, ³Division of Surgical Research, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland, ⁴Institute of Translational Cardiovascular Technologies, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

In this work we compare non-contrast enhanced imaging methods such as native T1, T2 mapping and cardiac diffusion tensor imaging, to ECV measurements in a longitudinal porcine study of myocardial infarction. T2 is elevated only during the acute stage. During the transition from acute to chronic stage T1 remains unchanged and ECV as well as MD progressively increase while FA decreases. During the acute stage, T2 mapping provides highest contrast whereas diffusional metrics showed larger changes during the chronic stage compared to native relaxometry showing the potential of DTI for probing dynamic myocardial changes upon an ischemic event.

Pawan Kumar¹, Uma Sharma¹, Rajeev Narang², and Sujeet Mewar^1
1Nuclear Magnetic Resonance and MRI Facility, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India, ²Cardiology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is caused by building up of plaque in the arteries of the heart, which narrows the lumen of arteries. Present study investigated the metabolic profile of blood plasma using 1H-NMR spectroscopy for distinguishing coronary artery disease (CAD) patients from healthy control (N). The results showed significant differences in the concentration of several metabolites like lactate, pyruvate, choline, acetate and alanine in the blood plasma of CAD patients in comparison to healthy controls suggesting alterations of several metabolic pathways including glycolysis, gluconeogenesis which may be related to the development of CAD.

Andrew Tyler^1,2, Justin Y C Lau¹, Jane Ellis¹, Jack J Miller^1,2,3, Paul A. Bottomley⁴, Christopher T Rodgers^1,5, Damian J Tyler^1,2, and Ladislav Valkovic^1,6
1Oxford Centre for Clinical Cardiac Magnetic Resonance Research, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom, ²Department of Physiology, Anatomy & Genetics, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom, ³Department of Physics, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom, ⁴The Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States, ⁵Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre, University of Cambidge, Cambridge, United Kingdom, ⁶Department of Imaging Methods, Institute of Measurement Science, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia

The intrinsically low SNR and long acquisition times of ³¹P spectroscopy make translation to clinical practice very challenging, even at ultra-high fields. In this study, 12 healthy volunteers were scanned twice at 7T with a short ³¹P CSI and reduced k-space acquisitions for reconstruction with the SLAM and SLIM algorithms. PCr/ATP ratio and PCr SNR were computed for each scan and coefficients of reproducibility and variability were calculated. Compared to a Fourier based reconstruction of the short ³¹P acquisition, SNR was significantly improved and PCr/ATP was maintained when SLAM and SLIM reconstructions were used.

Mengdi Jiang¹, Xianghua Huang², Guifen Yang³, Weiqiang Dou⁴, and Yong Shen^5
1Department of Medical Imaging, Jinling Hospital, Medical School of Nanjing University, NanJing, China, ²National Clinical Research Center of Kidney Disease, Jinling Hospital, Medical School of Nanjing University, NanJing, China, ³Department of Nuclear Medical, Jinling Hospital, Medical School of Nanjing University, NanJing, China, ⁴GE Healthcare,MR Research China, BeiJing, China, ⁵GE Healthcare,MR Enhanced Application China, BeiJing, China

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic value of myocardial diffusion and mechanical properties by using IVIM-DWI imaging, feature tracking and native T1 in patients with cardiac amyloidosis (CA). The relationships of strain, native T1, IVIM-derived parameters (ADC_slow, ADC_fast and F) and late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) were analyzed based on six mid-ventricle subregions. Significantly different IVIM related parameters were found in patients than healthy controls. Furthermore, IVIM parameters also showed significant correlation with peak strain and nativeT1. With these findings, IVIM parameters has proven as effective biomarkers in the diagnosis of cardiac microcirculation in CA patients.

Quentin Lebret^1,2, Pierre Bour^1,2, Valéry Ozenne^1,2, Nestór Pallares-Lupon^1,2, Richard Walton^1,2, and Bruno Quesson^1,2
1IHU Liryc, Electrophysiology and Heart Modeling Institute, fondation Bordeaux Université, Pessac, France, ²Univ. Bordeaux, INSERM, Centre de recherche CardioThoracique de Bordeaux, U1045, Bordeaux, France

3D MRI of the myocardium after an ischemic attack could provide an accurate scar segmentation, much needed by the clinicians. However, this type of acquisition, usually obtained by late gadolinium enhancement (LGE), is very time consuming. We combined a wave acquisition with an inversion pulse and a variable density Poisson undersampling strategy to accelerate 3D cardiac imaging. Retrospectively subsampled images of a sheep heart were successfully reconstructed with an acceleration factor of 4, opening the path to a fast high-resolution 3D LGE acquisition.

Lijun Zhang¹, Jinfan Tian², Xueyao Yang², Jing An ³, Yi He⁴, and Xiantao Song^2
1Department of Radiology, Beijing AnZhen Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China, ²Department of Cardiology, Beijing AnZhen Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China, ³3Siemens Shenzhen Magnetic Resonance Ltd, Beijing, China, ⁴Department of Radiology, Beijing Friendship Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China

This study investigated the benefits of percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in patients with chronic total occlusions (CTOs) by using cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMR)-feature tracking (CMR-FT).The results showed the infarct size and LVEF did not increase significantly from baseline to 1 year of follow-up.However, global peak strains improved over time, and GCS showed significant treatment effect of CTO-PCI in the entire CMR population,which indicated improvement in left ventricular function.

Alina Psenicny¹, Reza Hajhosseiny¹, Giorgia Milotta², Karl P Kunze³, Radhouene Neji^1,3, Amedeo Chiribiri¹, Pier Giorgio Masci¹, Claudia Prieto¹, and René M Botnar^1
1School of Biomedical Engineering and Imaging Sciences, King's College London, London, United Kingdom, ²Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging, UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology, University College London, London, United Kingdom, ³MR Research Collaborations, Siemens Healthcare Limited, Frimley, United Kingdom

A free-breathing water/fat motion corrected 3D grey blood phase sensitive inversion recovery (PSIR) late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) technique that achieves whole heart coverage and provided excellent agreement with 2D grey blood LGE MRI has been recently proposed. However, contrast washout due to the relatively long scan time of ~10 minutes may impact scar detection and limit spatial resolution. We therefore sought to investigate the feasibility of high-resolution slow infusion motion-corrected 3D grey blood PSIR-LGE in comparison with a conventional clinically used breath-held 2D grey blood PSIR-LGE MRI technique. Here we report first qualitative and quantitative results.

Hernán Mella^1,2,3, Hui Wang^4,5, and Sergio Uribe^2,3,6
1Department of Electrical Engineering, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile, ²Biomedical Imaging Center, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile, ³Millennium Nucleus for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance, ANID - Millennium Science Initiative Program, Santiago, Chile, ⁴Philips, Cincinnati, OH, United States, ⁵Department of Radiology, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH, United States, ⁶Department of Radiology, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile

We propose the Off-Resonance Insensitive Orthogonal CSPAMM sequence (ORI-O-CSPAMM). ORI-O-CSPAMM allows the acquisition of a CSPAMM grid in half of the acquisition time, removing off-resonance effects during the tagging preparation. Additionally, ORI-O-CSPAMM allows Magnitude Image CSPAMM Reconstruction (MICSR), which improves the tagging contrast through the cardiac cycle and remove spurious phases gained during the readout.

Changjing Feng¹, Wangyan Liu¹, Xiaoxuan Sun¹, Qiang Wang¹, Xiaomei Zhu¹, Xiaoyue Zhou², Yi Xu¹, and Yinsu Zhu^1
1The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China, ²Siemens Healthineers Ltd., Shanghai, China

Cardiac involvement is frequently observed in polymyositis (PM) and dermatomyositis (DM) but typically remains subclinical. Cardiac MR tissue characterization parameters could serve as early detection markers for myocardial involvement in PM/DM patients without overt LV dysfunction. PM and DM patients showed a different positive segment distribution of myocardial involvement, where PM patients was more serious than that in DM patients. Above all, CMR tissue characterization parameters can detect myocardial involvement characteristics between PM and DM and compare the differences between them.

Yuli Huang¹, Xinyang Wu², Lifei Ma², Haipeng Dong³, and Qian Jiang^2
1Philips Healthcare (Suzhou) Co., Ltd, Suzhou, China, ²Philips (China) Investment Co., Ltd., Shanghai, China, ³Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China

Diffusion MR is challenging in myocardium because of respiratory motion, cardiac pulsation, and field inhomogeneity in thorax. Diffusion tensor imaging using SE-EPI with respiratory navigation and cardiac triggering of 3 b values (300, 500, 800 s/mm²) was performed in 9 subjects. Sufficient image quality was obtained with b values of 300 and 500 s/mm². Significant difference was found in SNR, CNR, MD, and FA between various b values while not between myocardium segments. Intermediate b values are recommended to achieve a balance of image quality and diffusion sensitivity . Sufficient myocardium quiescent duration is extremely important for optimal diffusion image quality.

Wangyan Liu¹, Yinsu Zhu¹, and Yi Xu^1
1the first affiliated hospital of Nanjing medical university, Nanjing, China

We applied CMR-FT technique to evaluate LV and LA performance in IIM patients. The main findings were as follow: (1) compared with controls, the damaged LV strain in IIM patients mainly involved global and regional LV PS in longitudinal direction; (2) LA reservoir function and conduit function were impaired in IIM patients; (3) LA volumetric parameters and function parameters showed significant difference between IIM patients and the controls. (4) Combination of global LV longitudinal PS, LAVpre-ac index and Apical LV circumferential PS can improve diagnostic accuracy. Therefore, CMR-FT can help early diagnosis of cardiac involvement of IIM patients.

Mehrzad Tartibi¹, Randall Lee², Christopher Nguyen³, Jaume Coll-Font^3,4, Youngho Seo², and Qizhi Fang^2
1DelBeat Inc., Berkeley, CA, United States, ²University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, United States, ³Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, United States, ⁴Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States

The DTI measurement contains measurement noise dominantly exaggerated at the myocardium boarders. Accurate fiber orientation will improve the accuracy of mathematical modeling. It may shed light on the short-term and long-term effects of scar tissue on the myofiber's morphology locally and globally. We have developed a filter based on the three measured DTI quantities of helix angle, fractional anisotropy, and mean diffusivity. This filter's result enabled us to automatically segment the myocardium's primary structural part and remove the trabeculae and papillary muscles. Hence, found a linear correlation between the fiber helix angle and the ventricle wall thickness.

Yun Shang¹, Sebastian Theilenberg¹, Laura M. Schreiber^2,3, and Christoph Juchem^1,4
1Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, United States, ²Chair of Cellular and Molecular Imaging, Comprehensive Heart Failure Center, University Hospital Wuerzburg, Wuerzburg, Germany, ³Department of Cardiovascular Imaging, Comprehensive Heart Failure Center, University Hospital Wuerzburg, Wuerzburg, Germany, ⁴Department of Radiology, Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY, United States

B₀ simulation in the heart based on thoracic CT images is a powerful tool to investigate cardiac B₀ conditions in the general population for the development of an optimized cardiac B₀ shimming strategy. Thoracic CT scans typically have a limited field of view posing a challenge to the accuracy of field simulations. Here we present a systematic analysis of errors introduced by B₀ computations in the human heart from CT-based susceptibility distributions of limited field of view and present strategies to resemble B₀ conditions in the human heart to achieve elevated accuracy with model-based addition of selected anatomical features.

W. Patricia Bandettini¹, Christine Mancini², Sujata M. Shanbhag², Jennifer Lynn Henry², Margaret M. Lowery², Marcus Y. Chen², and Adrienne E. Campbell-Washburn^2
1NIH/NHLBI, Bethesda, MD, United States, ²NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH/NHLBI, BETHESDA, MD, United States

Low-field MRI may offer reduced artifacts in patients with implanted metallic devices.  In this early comparison, we sought to evaluate the appearance of artifacts seen on cardiac MR at a 0.55T versus 1.5T for common cardiovascular devices, including sternal wires, valves, surgical clips, and cardiac implantable electronic devices (CIEDs). For smaller discrete implants, the artifact profile was reduced at 0.55T, as expected. Whereas, CIED generators contributed significant artifacts at both field strengths, illustrating the complex relationship with material properties, sequence details and field strength.  Overall, lower field may offer some advantage for cardiac imaging of patients with common implanted devices.