Bhavana Shantilal Solanky1, Khaled Abdel-Aziz2, Marios Yiannakas1, Olga Ciccarelli2, Claudia A. M. Wheeler-Kingshott1
1NMR Research Unit, Department of Neuroinflammation, UCL Institute of Neurology, London, United Kingdom; 2NMR Research Unit, Department of Brain Repair and Rehabilitaion, UCL Institute of Neurology, London, United Kingdom
Here we demonstrate quantitative measurements of the Glutamate/Glutamine complex (Glx) in the cervical spinal cord of healthy controls using 1H MRS at 3T. Sequences readily available were compared for the measure of Glutamate and Glx in the spinal cord, a challenging region of interest due to its small volume, B0 inhomogeneities, and physiological motion. A short TE PRESS, and STEAM sequence were both tested. LCmodel was used to obtain measures for the reliability of the Glx fit (CRLB %) and concentrations. A reliable fit was found in all subjects using PRESS (CRLB<20%). No reliable Glx fits were achieved using STEAM.