Abstract #2998

A Simple Iterative Reduction Method for Optimization of Quantitative Magnetization Transfer Imaging

Ives R. Levesque¹, John G. Sled², G Bruce Pike¹

¹Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada; ²Mouse Imaging Centre, Hospital For Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

A method is presented for the selection of an optimal acquisition scheme for quantitative magnetization transfer imaging using pulsed off-resonance saturation. This method is based on the iterative reduction of a discrete sampling of the Z-spectrum. In vivo results demonstrate that optimized sampling improves parameter map quality and longitudinal reproducibility. The reduction method avoids clustering and repeated points, an attractive feature for the purpose of MT model validation. The optimal number of MT weightings is also investigated.