Usha Sinha1,
Ali Moghadasi2, Shantanu Sinha3
1Physics,
San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, United States; 2University
of California at San Diego, San Diego, CA, United States; 3Radiology,
University of California at San Diego, San Diego, CA, United States
The objective quantification of regional muscle deformation is a valuable clinical tool to evaluate normal and diseased muscle. 2D Strain and strain rate are kinematic properties that have been used to characterize myocardial and lingual deformation. However, the strain rate is 3 Dal as the tissue deformations are 3 dimensional. 3D strain rate measurement is challenging and requires 4D data acquisition. We report here, 3D strain tensor mapping of the medial gastrocnemius and show that the eigenvector associated with the negative eigenvalue deviates by 8-12o from the muscle fiber direction determined from diffusion tensor imaging.