Multidimensional T ₁ - T ₂ Relaxation Imaging In Vivo on a Portable 0.064 T MRI Scanner

To demonstrate the feasibility of whole-brain multidimensional T ₁ - T ₂ relaxation imaging on a portable 0.064 T MRI scanner.

A two-dimensional inversion-recovery, fast spin-echo acquisition was used to jointly encode T ₁ and T ₂ relaxation. Joint relaxation distributions were reconstructed voxel-wise using marginal-distribution constrained optimization (MADCO). The approach was evaluated in a quantitative relaxation MRI phantom and subsequently applied in vivo in a healthy volunteer. Joint distributions, marginal distributions, distribution-derived measures, and statistical dependencies between the two relaxation dimensions were examined.

Phantom joint relaxation estimates showed good overall agreement with mono-exponential relaxation measurements and previously reported values at 0.064 T. The in vivo acquisition provided whole-brain coverage over a broad range of relaxation weightings and tissue contrasts. Reconstructed joint T ₁ - T ₂ distributions showed spatially organized features across the relaxation space, including broad and overlapping relaxation components that were not fully represented by single-value relaxation maps or by either 1D marginal distribution alone. Selected regions of the joint relaxation space produced component maps with distinct spatial patterns. Statistical analysis further showed a dependence between the two relaxation dimensions, supporting the presence of added information in the joint distribution that is lost when treating T ₁ and T ₂ separately.

Whole-brain multidimensional T ₁ - T ₂ relaxation imaging is clinically feasible on a portable 0.064 T MRI scanner. Joint relaxation distributions provide information beyond single-value relaxation mapping and may support further developments of quantitative multidimensional imaging at ultra-low field.