Measuring human cardiac tissue sodium concentrations using surface coils, adiabatic excitation, and twisted projection imaging with minimal T2 losses.
OBJECTIVE
To measure tissue sodium concentrations in the human heart with (23)Na MRI using a surface coil, thereby eliminating the effects of inhomogeneous excitation by surface coils and minimizing T(1) and T(2) relaxation.


METHODS
We combined fully relaxed, very short-echo, (23)Na twisted projection imaging (TPI) with adiabatic half passage (AHP) excitation and external referencing on subjects and comparing with a concentration reference phantom scan to quantify TSC with surface coils. (23)Na signal losses during hard (square), composite, and tanh/tan amplitude/frequency-modulated AHP excitation pulses were analyzed over a wide range of RF field strengths and T(2short) values.


RESULTS
AHP excitation yielded a homogeneous excitation flip angle and negligible losses compared to a 90 degrees hard pulse wherever the B1 field exceeded the adiabatic threshold, rendering this sequence suitable for applications that use surface coil excitation. An AHP (23)Na TPI sequence was used with a surface coil at 1.5 T to noninvasively quantify myocardial TSC in 10 normal volunteers. The mean TSC was 43 +/- 4, 53 +/- 12, and 17 +/- 4 micromol/g in the left ventricular (LV) free wall, septum, and adipose tissue, respectively, consistent with prior invasive measurements on biopsy and autopsy specimens.


CONCLUSIONS
It is now possible to noninvasively quantify TSC in the human heart with surface coil (23)Na MRI.
Ouwerkerk
Ronald
R
Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland 21287-0845, USA. rouwerke@mri.jhu.edu
Weiss
Robert G
RG
Bottomley
Paul A
PA
D003198:Computer Simulation; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D009206:Myocardium / Q000378:metabolism*; D012964:Sodium / Q000378:metabolism*; D012975:Sodium Isotopes
D012975:Sodium Isotopes; D012964:Sodium