Carotid Intraplaque Hemorrhage Imaging with Quantitative Vessel Wall T1 Mapping: Technical Development and Initial
Haikun Qi1, Jie Sun1, Huiyu Qiao1
1From the Center for Biomedical Imaging Research, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Room 109, School of Medicine, Tsinghua University, Haidian District, Beijing 100084, China (H. Qi, H. Qiao, S.C., X.P., Y.W., X.Z., R.L., C.Y., H.C.); Philips Research China, Shanghai, China (Z.Z.); and Department of Radiology, University of Washington, Seattle, Wash (J.S., C.Y.).
A new 3D imaging sequence called GOAL-SNAP enables fast, high-resolution vessel wall T1 mapping. This technique accurately quantifies intraplaque hemorrhage, offering potential for improved atherosclerosis monitoring.
Area of Science:
- Medical Imaging
- Cardiovascular Disease Research
- Biomarker Development
Background:
- Quantitative T1 mapping of the vessel wall is crucial for characterizing plaque composition and disease progression.
- Existing methods for vessel wall T1 mapping often lack sufficient spatial resolution or are time-consuming.
- Intraplaque hemorrhage (IPH) is a key indicator of vulnerable atherosclerotic plaques, necessitating accurate detection and quantification.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop a novel three-dimensional (3D) imaging sequence for high-spatial-resolution, time-efficient quantitative vessel wall T1 mapping.
- To adapt the simultaneous noncontrast angiography and intraplaque hemorrhage (SNAP) imaging technique with 3D golden angle radial k-space sampling (GOAL-SNAP).
- To validate the accuracy and efficiency of the GOAL-SNAP sequence for T1 mapping in phantom and in vivo studies.
Main Methods:
- The GOAL-SNAP sequence was developed by integrating 3D golden angle radial sampling into the SNAP imaging framework.
- Sliding window reconstruction was employed for voxelwise T1 fitting across various inversion delay times.
- Phantom studies compared GOAL-SNAP T1 measurements against a 2D inversion recovery spin-echo (IR SE) sequence, followed by in vivo imaging in healthy volunteers and patients with atherosclerosis.
Main Results:
- Phantom studies demonstrated excellent correlation (R² = 0.99) between GOAL-SNAP and IR SE T1 measurements, with minimal bias and percentage error.
- In vivo studies revealed significantly lower minimum T1 values in vessel wall sections with IPH compared to those without (371 msec vs 944 msec, P = .01).
- Estimated T1 values for normal vessel wall and muscle were 1195 msec and 1117 msec, respectively.
Conclusions:
- The GOAL-SNAP sequence achieves high-spatial-resolution (0.8 mm isotropic) and time-efficient (5 minutes) vessel wall T1 mapping.
- This novel sequence provides quantitative and reproducible biomarkers for characterizing IPH.
- GOAL-SNAP holds promise for monitoring atherosclerosis progression and assessing plaque vulnerability.
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