Metabolite concentrations of healthy mouse brain by Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy at 7 Tesla

In vivo¹H short echo-time Magnetic Resonance spectra are made up of overlapping spectral components from many metabolites. Typically, they exibit low signal-to-noise ratio. Metabolite concentrations are obtained by quantitating such spectra. Quantitation is difficult due to the superposition of metabolite resonances, macromolecules, lipids and water residue contributions. A fitting algorithm invoking extensive prior knowledge is needed. We quantitated¹H in vivo mouse brain spectra obtained at 7 Tesla using the time-domain QUEST method combined with in vitro metabolite basis set signals. Brain metabolite concentrations estimated from eight mouse brain signals are compared to previously reported results.