During early infancy, dramatic structural and functional maturation of infant brains requires rapid increases of regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF). In this study, we optimized a 3D multi-shot, stack-of-spirals pCASL sequence to obtain high-resolution rCBF maps at isotropic 2.5mm for infants at different maturational stages. Distinctive rCBF distribution patterns at different infant stages of 0-6 months and 7-18 months were revealed. The age-dependent trend lines of rCBF at specific regions were charted. Infant rCBF increases heterogeneously across brain regions, with rCBF increasing faster in visual, prefrontal and parietal cortices than that in precentral and thalamus during this critical period.
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