Jessica L. Klaers1, Ethan K. Brodsky1,2, Walter F. Block1,3
1Medical Physics, University of Wisconsin - Madison, Madison, WI, USA; 2Radiology, University of Wisconsin - Madison, Madison, WI, USA; 3Biomedical Engineering, University of Wisconsin - Madison, Madison, WI, USA
It has been suggested that precise cartilage volume measurements used in longitudinal studies of cartilage degeneration and treatment measurements require an in-plane resolution on the order of 0.3mm. While 3D radial SSFP methods have proven to be powerful for cartilage assessment by consistently providing 0.47mm isotropic resolution in 5 minutes, the effects of further increasing the resolution by increasing undersampling are poorly understood. We examine the impact of varying the undersampling factor for a given resolution and scan time to obtain high isotropic resolution for cartilage volume measurements. Preliminary results utilizing new scanner technology demonstrate higher image quality than previously attainable at high resolution.