Enhancing k-space quantitative susceptibility mapping by enforcing consistency on the cone data (CCD) with structural...

Area of Science:

• Medical Imaging
• Computational Physics
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) reconstructs magnetic susceptibility from magnetic field data.
• The inversion process is ill-posed due to dipole kernel zeroes, causing streaking artifacts in QSM.
• Existing k-space methods struggle with these artifacts, limiting QSM accuracy.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel method for improving QSM by addressing k-space cone data inconsistencies.
• To reduce streaking artifacts in QSM using structural priors and consistency enforcement.
• To enhance the accuracy of quantitative susceptibility maps through improved inversion techniques.

Main Methods:

• A consistency on the cone data (CCD) method was developed, enforcing structural consistency with priors in the cone region.
• Information in the noncone region was kept consistent with k-space magnetic field measurements.
• The CCD method was evaluated against existing QSM algorithms using simulations, phantoms, and in vivo human brain data, compared to COSMOS results.

Main Results:

• The proposed CCD method effectively suppressed streaking artifacts in QSM.
• Enhanced QSM results demonstrated improved agreement with reference standards compared to other k-space methods.
• The technique successfully recovered missing information in the k-space cone region.

Conclusions:

• Enforcing consistency with structural priors in the cone region is crucial for recovering missing data.
• The CCD method significantly suppresses streaking artifacts, leading to more accurate QSM.
• This approach offers a promising solution for enhancing the quality and reliability of quantitative susceptibility mapping.