Recently, neuromelanin and nigrosome 1 imaging techniques have been developed to assess the substantia nigra in Parkinsons’s disease. Typically, the neuromlanin contrast is maximized by magnetization transfer pulses and the nigrosome 1 contrast is maximized by susceptibility weighting for the surrounding iron-rich regions, respectively. Since the contrast mechanisms of the two images are different, the separated scans are required to obtain the two contrasts. In this study, we investigate the potential utility of a 3D multi-echo gradient echo acquisition for simultaneous imaging of neuromelanin and nigrosome 1 in the substantia nigra.
