Fast cerebral flow territory mapping using vessel encoded dynamic arterial spin labeling (VE-DASL)

Area of Science:

• Neuroimaging
• Medical Physics
• Radiology

Background:

• Current whole-brain territory mapping using vessel-encoded pseudocontinuous arterial-spin-labeling (VE-pCASL) requires approximately 5 minutes, which is often too long for clinical use.
• Faster imaging techniques are needed for acute neurological conditions where rapid assessment is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

• To optimize vessel-encoded dynamic-ASL (VE-DASL) for rapid (<30 seconds) cerebral flow territory mapping.
• To enable whole-brain coverage suitable for acute clinical settings.

Main Methods:

• VE-DASL utilizes a continuous stream of magnetically labeled or unlabeled blood with distinct encoding patterns for each feeding artery.
• Inflow into brain tissue is continuously monitored, generating unique signal fluctuations within each territory.
• Clustering techniques followed by linear regression are used to reconstruct individual flow territories.

Main Results:

• VE-DASL was successfully implemented and validated as both a single-slice and whole-brain method.
• In vivo results demonstrated good agreement with gold-standard VE-pCASL territory maps.
• Dice similarity coefficients ranged from 83.4%–87.7% (RICA), 81.7%–83.1% (LICA), and 64.3%–71.8% (vertebral arteries).

Conclusions:

• VE-DASL offers the potential for rapid whole-brain mapping of major cerebral flow territories.
• The short scan duration (approximately 30 seconds) makes VE-DASL highly suitable for acute clinical applications.