The effect of spiral trajectory correction on pseudo-continuous arterial spin labeling with high-performance...

To demonstrate the feasibility of pseudo-continuous arterial-spin-labeled (pCASL) imaging with 3D fast-spin-echo stack-of-spirals on a compact 3T scanner (C3T), to perform trajectory correction for eddy-current-induced deviations in the spiral readout of pCASL imaging, and to assess the correction effect on perfusion-related images with high-performance gradients (80 mT/m, 700T/m/s) of the C3T.

To track eddy-current-induced artifacts with Archimedean spiral readout, the spiral readout in pCASL imaging was performed with 5 different peak gradient slew rate (S_max ) values ranging from 70 to 500 T/m/s. The trajectory for each S_max was measured using a dynamic field camera and applied in a density-compensated gridding image reconstruction in addition to the nominal trajectory. The effect of the trajectory correction was assessed with perfusion-weighted (ΔM) images and proton-density-weighted images as well as cerebral blood flow (CBF) maps, obtained from 10 healthy volunteers.

Blurring artifact on ΔM images was mitigated by the trajectory correction. CBF values on the left and right calcarine cortices showed no significant difference after correction. Also, the signal-to-noise ratio of ΔM images improved, on average, by 7.6% after correction (P < .001). The greatest improvement of 12.1% on ΔM images was achieved with a spiral readout using S_max of 300~400 T/m/s.

Eddy currents can cause spiral trajectory deviation, which leads to deformation of the CBF map even in cases of low value S_max . The trajectory correction for spiral-readout-based pCASL produces more reliable results for perfusion imaging. These results suggest that pCASL is feasible on C3T with high-performance gradients.