Abstract #4216

Simultaneous Relaxometry and Susceptibility Imaging in the Brain

Cheng-Chieh Cheng¹,², Tzu-Cheng Chao³, Hsiao-Wen Chung¹, Bruno Madore², Lawrence P. Panych²

¹Graduate Institute of Biomedical Electronics and Bioinformatics, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; ²Radiology, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; ³Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering, National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan

Brain iron accumulation may be related to various neurological diseases such as Parkinsons disease, Alzheimers disease, and multiple sclerosis. Quantitative MR techniques, such as MR relaxometry and susceptibility mapping can be helpful toward quantifying brain iron content. A novel approach is proposed that can simultaneously measure T2, T2* and susceptibility-induced internal field perturbations from the same rapid scan. It is hoped that the present method may prove a useful tool toward investigating conditions linked with elevated brain iron content.