Porcine Imaging in a 10.5T Whole-Body Human MRI
Lance DelaBarre1, Russell L. Lagore1, Yigitcan Eryaman1, Gregor Adriany1, and J. Thomas Vaughan1

1Center for Magnetic Resonance Research - University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, United States

Synopsis

Recently, our 10.5T whole-body MRI magnet achieved field strength and its installation was completed. While waiting for IRB and IDE approval, a human-sized porcine model serves as a surrogate for later human studies, thus allowing development of techniques in vivo. Using an 8-channel head coil on a porcine head, the first in vivo images from the 10.5T whole-body MRI were acquired.

Objective

To develop in vivo imaging with pigs as a precursor to human studies in a whole-body 10.5 T MR system.

Introduction

Recently, our 10.5T MRI magnet achieved field strength and its installation was completed. This represents the highest whole-body operational system for human MR imaging. Before imaging humans, however, we must obtain both IRB and Investigational Device Exemption approval. Until then, we are using anesthetized human-sized pigs to gather preliminary data for those approvals and taking the opportunity to refine hardware systems and procedures for in vivo imaging.

Methods

A human-sized pig was anesthetized according to our approved IACUC protocol and imaged as a surrogate for later human studies. The 10.5T / 88 cm whole body magnet by Agilent (Santa Clara, CA) is currently the world’s highest strength whole-body MR magnet. To achieve this field strength, the passively shielded magnet shown in Figure 1 is 4.1 m long and 3.2 m wide, and contains 433 km of NbTi wire cooled to below 3 K. The 88 cm warm-bore accommodates commercial whole-body gradients, which in this case is an SC72 body gradient (Siemens Healthcare, Erlangen, DE) with 70 mT/m maximum amplitude and 200 T/m/s maximum slew rate. Anticipating increased susceptibility inhomogeneities, the system was outfitted with five 2nd order shims and four 3rd order shims each driven by a 20 A power supply. The width of the bore liner tube (patient space) is the standard whole-body 60 cm. The Siemens MAGNETOM console has 32 receive channels and 16 parallel transmit waveform generators driving 16 2-kW RF amplifiers (Stolberg HF-Technik AG, Stolberg, DE). A 16-channel Transmit/Receive interface with integrated pre-amplifiers (Virtumed LLC, Minneapolis, MN) was connected to an 8-channel end-loaded dipole head coil. The elements are 16 cm long (two 8 cm segments) and arranged on a cylinder with an inner diameter of 25 cm. The end-loaded dipole has a perpendicular plate on the end-walls of the cylinder to fore-shorten the elements and has been previously modeled.1 The head of an anesthetized and ventilated 35 kg pig, outfitted with patient monitoring equipment, was loaded into the coil in supine position. The 8-channel coil was B1 shimmed over the brain and the flip angle in the brain was calibrated.2-4 Gradient echo images were collected with the following parameters: α = 6°, TR/TE=50/3.39 ms, 256x256, 0.77 x 0.77 x 3 (mm)3, NEX=2. Turbo spin-echoes with the same resolution, one acquisition, TR/TE = 5000/60 ms, 130° refocusing pulses, and an echo train length of 7 were also acquired.

Results

The B1 shim over the brain resulted in an excitation pattern in the brain that was higher near the throat but rapidly dropped off outside the brain in the central area of the throat and intubation tube. Transverse and coronal slices from a GRE sequence are shown in Figures 2 and 3, respectively. Figure 4 is a TSE image with the same slice as Figure 3.

Discussion

The images presented demonstrate that most of the procedures for in vivo imaging are operational. There is no evidence of noise leaking into the images. B1 shimming is working, at least for this relatively small target. Most of the animal/patient monitoring equipment either works or needs only minor adjustments, such as longer cabling to reach into the long bore or to keep equipment further from the magnet fringe field.

Conclusion

The first in vivo images were collected from the 10.5T whole-body MRI.

Acknowledgements

NIH-R01-EB006835, NIH-R01 EB007327, NIH-P41-EB015894

References

1. Tian J, Lagore R, Vaughan JT. Dipole Arrays for MR Head Imaging: 7T Vs. 10.5T. Proceedings 23rd Scientific Meeting, ISMRM; 2015; Toronto, ON. p 3116.

2. Van de Moortele PF, Akgun C, Adriany G, Moeller S, Ritter J, Collins CM, Smith MB, Vaughan JT, Ugurbil K. B1 destructive interferences and spatial phase patterns at 7 T with a head transceiver array coil. Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. 2005;54(6):1503-18.

3. Van de Moortele P, Ugurbil K. Very Fast Multi Channel B1 Calibration at High Field in the Small Flip Angle Regime. Proceedings 17th Scientific Meeting, ISMRM; 2009 April; Honolulu. p 367.

4. Yarnykh VL. Actual flip-angle imaging in the pulsed steady state: a method for rapid three-dimensional mapping of the transmitted radiofrequency field. Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. 2007;57(1):192-200.

Figures

Figure 1 The 10.5T whole-body magnet. The bore is the standard 60 cm width. The size of the magnet itself, 3.2 m wide, makes the bore appear smaller.

Figure 2 10.5T transverse GRE images (TR/TE = 50/3.39 ms) of porcine brain.

Figure 3 10.5T coronal GRE images (TR/TE = 50/3.39 ms) of porcine brain.

Figure 4 10.5T coronal TSE images (TR/TE = 5000/60 ms) of porcine brain.



Proc. Intl. Soc. Mag. Reson. Med. 24 (2016)
0541