Choukri Mekkaoui1,
Sonia Nielles-Vallespin2, Marcel Parolin Jackowski3,
Timothy G. Reese4, Peter David Gatehouse2, David N.
Firmin2, David E. Sosnovik4
1Harvard
Medical School - Massachusetts General Hospital - Athinoula A Martinos center
for Biomedical, Boston, MA, United States; 2CMR Unit, Royal
Brompton Hospital, London, United Kingdom; 3University of So
Paulo, So Paulo, Brazil; 4Harvard Medical School - Massachusetts
General Hospital - Athinoula A Martinos center for Biomedical, Charlestown,
MA, United States
The physiological motion inherent to multibreathold in vivo Diffusion Tensor MRI (DTI) acquisitions impacts the estimation of diffusion based-indices as well as accurate tractography of myofiber architecture. We therefore developed a novel automated motion correction scheme to improve the accuracy of in vivo DTI-tractography in the heart. An average SNR increase of 21% and a reduction in the propagation angle by up to 33% were observed after motion correction, indicating more accurate quantification of diffusion based-indices and more coherent fiber tracts. This will be particularly important for free breathing navigator-based DTI of the heart.