Target Audience

The target audience for this presentation is researchers interested in Magnetization Transfer (MT), quantitative MT (qMT), and clinicians interested in understanding the benefit of alternative contrasts for assessing pathology.

Objectives

The objectives of this presentation are to provide a guide for understanding the differences between conventional MT and quantitative MT, and understanding the details of qMT data acquisition, modeling and analysis. We will discuss the assumptions within qMT models and the impact it has on analysis/quantification. We will close by discussing qMT applications and utilization across multiple pathologies.

Overview of Presentation

Magnetization Transfer is the transfer of spin information between semi-solid protons typically associated with macromolecules and surrounding water. An MT experiment is designed to exploit this exchange phenomenon through a variety of MRI pulse sequences, such as multiple off-resonance saturation pulses, or multiple inversion times. Often, the MT effect is modeled by a 2-pool (or more) model which is then applied to multi-dynamic MRI data to estimate indices such as the pool-size ratio, the rate of MT exchange, relaxation rates for each of the pools, etc. We will examine a few of the MRI pulse sequences and how data is generated and then analyzed. The MT parameters that have been extracted have been related to myelin concentration, inflammation with a purported greater sensitivity than relaxation-based MRI techniques alone. We will further examine this sensitivity and specificity compared to existing methods, and alternative myelin-sensitive methods.

Acknowledgements

No acknowledgement found.

References

No reference found.