title: All-systolic non-ECG-gated myocardial perfusion MRI: Feasibility of multi-slice continuous first-pass imaging.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To develop and test the feasibility of a new method for non-ECG-gated first-pass perfusion (FPP) cardiac MR capable of imaging multiple short-axis slices at the same systolic cardiac phase.
  
  
  METHODS
  A magnetization-driven pulse sequence was developed for non-ECG-gated FPP imaging without saturation-recovery preparation using continuous slice-interleaved radial sampling. The image reconstruction method, dubbed TRACE, used self-gating based on reconstruction of a real-time image-based navigator combined with reference-constrained compressed sensing. Data from ischemic animal studies (n = 5) was used in a simulation framework to evaluate temporal fidelity. Healthy subjects (n = 5) were studied using both the proposed approach and the conventional method to compare the myocardial contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR). Patients (n = 2) underwent adenosine stress studies using the proposed method.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Temporal fidelity of the developed method was shown to be sufficient at high heart-rates. The healthy volunteers studies demonstrated normal perfusion and no dark-rim artifacts. Compared with the conventional scheme, myocardial CNR for the proposed method was slightly higher (8.6 ± 0.6 versus 8.0 ± 0.7). Patient studies showed stress-induced perfusion defects consistent with invasive angiography.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The presented methods and results demonstrate feasibility of the proposed approach for high-resolution non-ECG-gated FPP imaging of 3 myocardial slices at the same systolic phase, and indicate its potential for achieving desirable image quality (high CNR and no dark-rim artifacts).
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Imaging Research Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: Behzad
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Sharif
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Imaging Research Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: Reza
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Arsanjani
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Imaging Research Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: Rohan
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Dharmakumar
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Barbra Streisand Women's Heart Center, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: C Noel
authors.initials: CN
authors.lastname: Bairey Merz
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Imaging Research Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: Daniel S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Berman
authors.affiliation: Biomedical Imaging Research Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA.|David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
authors.forename: Debiao
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D055424:Cardiac-Gated Imaging Techniques; D003324:Coronary Artery Disease / Q000473:pathology*; D004285:Dogs; D005240:Feasibility Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007089:Image Enhancement / Q000379:methods*; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D018810:Magnetic Resonance Angiography / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D017202:Myocardial Ischemia / Q000473:pathology*; D055414:Myocardial Perfusion Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted
keywords: continuous acquisition; dark rim artifact; first-pass perfusion; ischemia; myocardial perfusion; radial sampling; real-time navigator; systolic; ungated