David M. Wilson1, Kayvan Keshari1, Peder E. Larson1, Albert P. Chen2, Simon Hu1, Robert A. Bok1, Sarah J. Nelson1, Daniel B. Vigneron1, John Kurhanewicz1
1Department of Radiology, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA; 2GE Healthcare
A new method for hyperpolarizing 13C- sodium bicarbonate was developed, and combined with a co-polarization approach that allowed dual polarization of both 13C sodium bicarbonate and [1-13C] pyruvate. Polarizations of 11% and 16% were achieved, respectively, with the corresponding T1’s 50 and 68s at 3T. Rapid equilibrium of injected 13C sodium bicarbonate with 13C CO2 allowed calculation of pH on a voxel by voxel basis, and tumor metabolism was observed by conversion of [1-13C] pyruvate to its metabolic products. These studies confirm the feasibilty of simultaneous measuring in-vivo pH and metabolism using nontoxic, endogenous species at clinically relevant field strengths.