Rong Luo1, Soorena Azam ZAnganeh1, Hongda Shao1, Jun Chen1, Graeme Bydder1, and Jiang Du1
MS is a disease that relatively
specifically affects myelin which is invisible with
conventional sequences. Adiabatic inversion recovery prepared ultrashort echo
time (IR-UTE) sequences have been proposed to directly image myelin protons and
suppress the long T2 water signal by adiabatic inversion and signal nulling.
However, water signal contamination is a major challenge. T1 variation in long
T2 white matter, and thus imperfect choice of TI is a potential source of error
in direct myelin imaging. We aimed to investigate the T1 variation in long T2
white matter in volunteers, and the effects of this on IR-UTE imaging of myelin.