Development, integration and use of an ultra-high-strength gradient system on a human-size 3 T magnet for small animal MRI

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 14; no. 6; p. e0217916
• Main Authors: Cho, Kuan-Hung, Huang, Sheng-Min, Choi, Chang-Hoon, Chen, Ming-Jye, Chiang, Hsuan-Han, Buschbeck, Richard P, Farrher, Ezequiel, Shah, N Jon, Garipov, Ruslan, Chang, Ching-Ping, Chang, Hsu, Kuo, Li-Wei
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 03.06.2019; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Analysis; Animal experimentation; Animal health; Animals; Biology and Life Sciences; Biomedical engineering; Brain; Brain - diagnostic imaging; Brain - pathology; Brain injuries; Brain Injuries, Traumatic - diagnostic imaging; Brain research; Calibration; Diagnosis; Diffusion Tensor Imaging; Disease Models, Animal; Engineering; Feasibility studies; Gene mapping; Ghosts; Head injuries; High strength; Humans; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; In vivo methods and tests; Laboratory rats; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Magnets; Mapping; Medical imaging; Medical imaging equipment; Medical research; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Neuroimaging; Neurosciences; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Phantoms, Imaging; Physical Sciences; Quality; Rats; Research and Analysis Methods; Scanners; Sequences; Studies; Tensors; Time Factors; Traumatic brain injury; Water; Aachen Germany; Germany; Taiwan
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0217916

This study aims to integrate an ultra-high-strength gradient coil system on a clinical 3 T magnet and demonstrate its preclinical imaging capabilities. Dedicated phantoms were used to qualitatively and quantitatively assess the performance of the gradient system. Advanced MR imaging sequences, including diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM), were implemented and executed on an ex vivo specimen as well as in vivo rats. The DTI and QSM results on the phantom agreed well with those in the literature. Furthermore, studies on ex vivo specimens have demonstrated the applicability of DTI and QSM on our system to probe microstructural changes in a mild traumatic brain injury rat model. The feasibility of in vivo rat DTI was also demonstrated. We showed that the inserted ultra-high-strength gradient coil was successfully integrated on a clinically used magnet. After careful tuning and calibration, we verified the accuracy and quantitative preclinical imaging capability of the integrated system in phantom and in vivo rat brain experiments. This study can be essential to establish dedicated animal MRI platform on clinical MRI scanners and facilitate translational studies at clinical settings.