Ji-Yeon Suh1,
Woo Hyun Shim1, Christian Thomas Farrar1, Jeong Kon Kim2,
Young Ro Kim1
1Athinoula
A, Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusettes General Hospital,
Charlestown, MA, United States; 2Department of medical imaging, Asan
Medical Center, University of Ulsan, Seoul, Korea, Democratic People's
Republic of
Cerebral vasoreactivity to hypercapnic stimulation has been used for assessing the cerebrovascular function altered by various pathophysiological states. In this study, in order to characterize hemodynamic changes during the inhalation of different CO2 gas concentration, multiple MRI-derived hemodynamic parameters were measured using an alternating GE/SE EPI and an intravascular contrast agent in the spontaneously breathing mice. Significant vasodilation was observed, in which the dynamic features of response curve and response magnitude were CO2 dose-dependent. Our results demonstrated the experimental setting that produces consistent vasoreactive responses in mice, thus validating the hypercapnic method that can be used to evaluate the altered hemodynamic function in various cerebrovascular disease models.