Improved estimation of tissue hydration and bound water fraction in rat liver tissue.

Based on recent improvements in the field, biexponential data from fresh rat liver and monoexponential data from cold storage experiments allow quantification of three distinct relaxation components in liver tissue: bound water (4.2%, R1 = 12.0 +/- 1.

Liver tissue characterization by in vitro NMR: tissue handling and biological variation.

The extraction of reliable and useful relaxation time data for tissue characterization by NMR requires strict protocols, optimized for each type of biological tissue, which include parameters like storage duration and temperature as well as measurement parameters. Spin-lattice relaxation times in liver tissue vary not only with NMR frequency but also with their "time-after-excision characteristics," while spin-spin relaxation times are almost independent of most parameters which influence T1 at 20 MHz in normal liver tissue (e.g.

Cold-preserved rat liver viability testing by proton nuclear magnetic resonance relaxometry.

The results of a series of experiments in the cold-preserved rat liver, applying a newly developed method of pretransplant viability testing, are described. The livers were stored either under simple hypothermic conditions (KHB) or in EC, HTK, or UW preservation solution. Livers were stored up to 48 hr and reperfused after a period of hypothermic storage of 1, 7, 14, or 21 hr.

Viability testing of transplantation donor liver by 1H NMR relaxometry.

We present preliminary results of water proton relaxation time measurements on perfused, cold-stored rat livers as a basis of a simple method for testing the viability of human donor livers in liver transplantation surgery. Proton T1 and T2 data correlated strongly (p less than 0.01) with bile flow measurements, indicating that relaxation times reflect organ viability and therefore might be used for rapid testing of donor livers shortly before transplantation.