In recent years MRI has become a valuable imaging modality within ophthalmology, as it is able to non-invasively image parts of the eye which are not accessible with optical techniques^1-3. One of the key applications of ocular MRI is providing accurate three-dimensional geometric measures on the location, geometry and size of tumours: these measures determine the choice of optimal treatment. Accurate size measurements require very high spatial resolution, and so ocular imaging benefits from high field MRI due to the increased SNR available. However, one of the main challenges is eye-motion, as this results in significant image artifacts, which mask any extrascleral extension of the tumour. Different strategies have been developed to reduce the amount of motion artefacts, including cued-blinking protocols which consist of a regular pause in the scan during which the subject can blink. These strategies resolve most of the motion-artifacts, but the sudden increase of acoustic noise at the beginning of each acquisition-block tends to introduce unconscious eye-blinks. In this study we evaluated the use of 3D Zero Echo Time (ZTE)-imaging^4,5 to visualize the eye for three main reasons. First, ZTE sequences have a very low acoustic noise level, which significantly increases patient comfort and decreases the involuntary blink reflexes. Second, they have the potential to visualize bony structures surrounding the eye, which can aid in radiotherapy planning. Finally, the inherent 3D nature of the sequence is advantageous in terms of the highly irregular shape of the tumour which require multiple cuts in different orientations to assess the optimal treatment. “Native ZTE” produces relatively poor image contrast, and to overcome the intrinsic contrast limitations, different magnetization-prepared contrast manipulation schemes were applied to image the eye silently (Figure 1).Three healthy subjects and two patients with an intra-ocular tumour (uveal melanoma) were examined on a Philips Achieva 7 Tesla whole-body magnet using a custom-built eye-coil1. In addition to the standard clinical eye-protocol,^1,2 3D radial FID-sampling ZTE-scans were acquired with a TR of 2 ms, a TE of 80 µs, a flip angle of 2°, an isotropic voxel size of 1 mm³ and a field-of-view of 120 x 120 x 120 mm³, resulting in a total scanning time of 1:03 minutes for native ZTE (proton density, PD) contrast. Three different magnetization preparation modules were used before the ZTE readout. First, a spectral inversion recovery (SPIR) pulse was repeated every 100 ms to suppress fat. Second, a T2-preparation module with a TE of 40 ms using two 180^o RF pulses to minimize first order B1+effects, repeated every 900 ms resulting in a slightly longer scan time of 1:55 minutes. Finally a fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) contrast was introduced using an inversion time of 1280 ms. The corresponding prepulse was repeated every 3 seconds to allow for sufficient time for T₁ relaxation, resulting in a total scan time of 6 minutes.All volunteers and especially the patients reported a much more comfortable experience during the ZTE scans, with much less propensity to blink due to the almost silent nature of the scans. Figure 2 show images from one of the uveal melanoma patients. Magnetization prepared ZTE images with different contrasts are shown, together with one image from a conventional imaging sequence. The SPIR-prepared ZTE is not particularly useful in measuring tumour size due to lack of contrast, but it is very useful for investigating diseases of the optic nerve since the combination of SPIR+ZTE gives good visualization of the optic nerve (Figure 3). The MTC-effect associated with the frequent applications of off-resonant RF pulses also introduces contrast between the lens and the vitreous humour. The T2-prepulse and ZTE readout gives the highest contrast, as shown in Figures 2 and 4. In addition there is significant contrast between the vitreous humour and retinal fluid. Figures 3-5 further underline the additional advantage 3D ZTE offers i.e. the isotropic spatial resolution. Reformatting in any desired orientation is possible after scanning allowing an detailed inspection and a simplified workflow for treatment planning.In conclusion, magnetization-prepared 3D ZTE schemes in combination with localised receive technology at high field could be very useful to improve diagnosis, therapy decision and comfort of ocular tumour patients. In terms of future applications to radiotherapy planning, the potential to see bony structures surrounding the orbit using ZTE would be very advantageous.