Catherine J. Simpkin1,
Sharon L. Giles1, David John Collins1, 2,
Veronica A. Morgan1, David M. Higgins3, Nandita M.
deSouza, 12
1MRI
Department, Royal Marsden Hospital, Sutton, Surrey, United Kingdom; 2Clinical
Magnetic Resonance, Institute of Cancer Research, Sutton, Surrey, United
Kingdom; 3Clinical Science, Philips Healthcare, Guildford, Surrey,
United Kingdom
Visualisation of lung tissue is difficult on conventional T2W imaging due to aeration and minimal tissue density. In this study normal volunteers and patients with a history of lung cancer were scanned using an ultrashort TE (UTE) sequence to obtain signal from lung tissue. T2* estimates were significantly higher in volunteers than in patients for hilar and basal lung regions (p=0.001, p=0.04), but not at the apices, likely due to emphysematous changes in the patients. T2* estimates were higher in previously irradiated segments than non-irradiated lung in patients, but a larger cohort is needed for verification.