Passive Tracking Device with a Controllable Susceptibility Effect: Demonstration with Catheter in vivo.

William Dominguez-Viqueira¹, Hirad Karimi¹, ², Jennifer Barry¹, Charles H. Cunningham¹, ²

Due to the rich anatomic information available, MRI is an attractive tool for guiding endovascular interventions. In this work, a susceptibility-based tracking device which can be mechanically turned ON and OFF is implemented in a catheter tip and demonstrated in vivo. The difference between the aligned and miss-aligned configurations was large in the acquired MR images, showing the feasibility of tracking the device. Even though the device was demonstrated in a catheter, it can also be designed for different tools or devices for interventional MR procedures. In future work, faster imaging sequences will be implemented for real-time tracking.