Xiao Wang1,
Xiao-hong Zhu1, Yi Zhang1, Wei Chen1
1Center for Magnetic Resonance
Research, Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN,
United States
The
feasibility of saturation-recovery T1 MRI for imaging and quantifying
absolute CBF change was further tested at 9.4T using a rat hypercapnia model
on two aspects: using diffusion gradients to investigate macrovascular inflow
contribution; and slab saturation with varied thickness to test the effects
of blood transit distance on measuring CBF. The results indicate that the
outcomes of CBF changes induced by hypercapnia were coincident with the
literature reports, and not significantly affected by large-vessel inflow
effect and blood transit time. The overall results demonstrate that the
saturation-recovery T1 MRI is sensitive to microvascular perfusion; it
provides a noninvasive and reliable imaging approach for studying cerebral
perfusion changes induced by physiology or pathology perturbation.