Whole-heart T₁ mapping using a 2D fat image navigator for respiratory motion compensation

To combine a 3D saturation-recovery-based myocardial T₁ mapping (3D SASHA) sequence with a 2D image navigator with fat excitation (fat-iNAV) to allow 3D T₁ maps with 100% respiratory scan efficiency and predictable scan time.

Data from T₁ phantom and 10 subjects were acquired at 1.5T. For respiratory motion compensation, a 2D fat-iNAV was acquired before each 3D SASHA k-space segment to correct for 2D translational motion in a beat-to-beat fashion. The effect of the fat-iNAV on the 3D SASHA T1 estimation was evaluated on the T₁ phantom. For 3 representative subjects, the proposed free-breathing 3D SASHA with fat-iNAV was compared to the original implementation with the diaphragmatic navigator. The 3D SASHA with fat-iNAV was compared to the breath-hold 2D SASHA sequence in terms of accuracy and precision.

In the phantom study, the Bland-Altman plot shows that the 2D fat-iNAVs does not affect the T₁ quantification of the 3D SASHA acquisition (0 ± 12.5 ms). For the in vivo study, the 2D fat-iNAV permits to estimate the respiratory motion of the heart, while allowing for 100% scan efficiency, improving the precision of the T₁ measurement compared to non-motion-corrected 3D SASHA. However, the image quality achieved with the proposed 3D SASHA with fat-iNAV is lower compared to the original implementation, with reduced delineation of the myocardial borders and papillary muscles.

We demonstrate the feasibility to combine the 3D SASHA T₁ mapping imaging sequence with a 2D fat-iNAV for respiratory motion compensation, allowing 100% respiratory scan efficiency and predictable scan time.