Microvascular response to exercise varies along the length of the tibialis anterior muscle.

Microvascular function is an important component in the physiology of muscle. One of the major parameters, blood perfusion, can be measured noninvasively and quantitatively by arterial spin labeling (ASL) MRI. Most studies using ASL in muscle have only reported data from a single slice, thereby assuming that muscle perfusion is homogeneous within muscle, whereas recent literature has reported proximodistal differences in oxidative capacity and perfusion.

A split-label design for simultaneous measurements of perfusion in distant slices by pulsed arterial spin labeling.

Purpose: Multislice arterial spin labeling (ASL) MRI acquisitions are currently challenging in skeletal muscle because of long transit times, translating into low-perfusion SNR in distal slices when large spatial coverage is required. However, fiber type and oxidative capacity vary along the length of healthy muscles, calling for multislice acquisitions in clinical studies. We propose a new variant of flow alternating inversion recovery (FAIR) that generates sufficient ASL signal to monitor exercise-induced perfusion changes in muscle in two distant slices.

Zero Echo Time O-MRI Reveals Decreased Cerebral Metabolic Rate of Oxygen Consumption in a Murine Model of Amyloidosis.

The cerebral metabolic rate of oxygen consumption (CMRO) is a key metric to investigate the mechanisms involved in neurodegeneration in animal models and evaluate potential new therapies. CMRO can be measured by direct O magnetic resonance imaging (O-MRI) of HO signal changes during inhalation of O-labeled oxygen gas. In this study, we built a simple gas distribution system and used 3D zero echo time (ZTE-)MRI at 11.

Multi-center evaluation of stability and reproducibility of quantitative MRI measures in healthy calf muscles.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate temporal stability, multi-center reproducibility and the influence of covariates on a multimodal MR protocol for quantitative muscle imaging and to facilitate its use as a standardized protocol for evaluation of pathology in skeletal muscle. Quantitative T2, quantitative diffusion and four-point Dixon acquisitions of the calf muscles of both legs were repeated within one hour. Sixty-five healthy volunteers (31 females) were included in one of eight 3-T MR systems.

Using bidirectional chemical exchange for improved hyperpolarized [ C]bicarbonate pH imaging.

Purpose: Rapid chemical exchange can affect SNR and pH measurement accuracy for hyperpolarized pH imaging with [ C]bicarbonate. The purpose of this work was to investigate chemical exchange effects on hyperpolarized imaging sequences to identify optimal sequence parameters for high SNR and pH accuracy.

Methods: Simulations were performed under varying rates of bicarbonate-CO chemical exchange to analyze exchange effects on pH quantification accuracy and SNR under different sampling schemes.