Mouse Cardiac MRI: Comparison of Prospective Synchronization using Optical & ECG Signals with a Retrospective Technique

Raphal Sablong¹, Adrian Rengle¹, Audrey Pouzin¹, Olivier Beuf¹

An optical-based device designed to synchronize MRI acquisition on small animals was developed using a transmit-receive pair of optical fibers. The suitability of the developed device was assessed on ten mice and compared with ECG-gated and a retrospective technique (IntraGate). MR images of mice heart depict low visible motion artifacts with all three investigated methods and no significant SNR differences were found on images acquired or processed with these different methods. However, depending on device used, the triggering point does not correspond to the same instant of the cardiac cycle inducing a time shift between image series acquired with the devices.