Improved myocardial scar characterization by super-resolution reconstruction in late gadolinium enhanced MRI

Image resolution is an important factor for accurate myocardial scar assessment from late gadolinium enhanced (LGE) MR. It has been shown that the conventionally used short-axis (SA) LGE acquisition with anisotropic resolution may overestimate the scar size due to partial volume effect, undermining the prognostic and diagnostic accuracy of LGE MRI in critical clinical applications. In this work, we present a method for combining three complementary anisotropic orthogonal LGE sequences of the heart region into a single isotropic volume. Our algorithm is based on the super-resolution reconstruction technique and employs joint localized gradient-correlation-based technique for compensation of breathing motion. The proposed method was validated on the gold standard electroanatomical voltage mapping (EAVM) data of 15 post-infarction patients. The reconstructed myocardial scar image demonstrated improved agreement with the EAVM compared to the conventional SA image, especially at the clinically significant gray zone region.