Artifact properties of carbon nanotube yarn electrode in magnetic resonance imaging

Deep brain stimulating (DBS) is a rapidly developing therapy that can treat many refractory neurological diseases. However, the traditional DBS electrodes which are made of Pt-Ir alloy may induce severe field distortions in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) which leads to artifacts that will lower the local image quality and cause inconvenience or interference. A novel DBS electrode made from carbon nanotube yarns (CNTYs) is brought up to reduce the artifacts. This study is therefore to evaluate the artifact properties of the novel electrode.

We compared its MR artifact characteristics with the Pt-Ir electrode in water phantom, including its artifact behaviors at different orientations as well as at various off-center positions, using both spin echo (SE) and gradient echo (GE) sequences, and confirmed its performance in vivo.

The results in phantom showed that the CNTY electrode artifacts reduced as much as 62% and 74% on GE and SE images, respectively, compared to the Pt-Ir one. And consistent behaviors were confirmed in vivo. The susceptibility difference was identified as the dominant cause in producing artifacts.

Employing the CNTY electrode may generate much less field distortion in the vicinity, improve local MR image quality and possibly be beneficial in various aspects.