Development of a robust diffusion-MR elastography (dMRE) technique to mitigate intravoxel phase dispersion

Daiki Ito; Tomokazu Numano; Kazuyuki Mizuhara; Toshikatsu Washio; Masaki Misawa; Naotaka Nitta

doi:10.1016/j.mri.2018.08.016

Development of a robust diffusion-MR elastography (dMRE) technique to mitigate intravoxel phase dispersion

Magn Reson Imaging. 2018 Dec:54:160-170. doi: 10.1016/j.mri.2018.08.016. Epub 2018 Aug 30.

Authors

Daiki Ito¹, Tomokazu Numano², Kazuyuki Mizuhara³, Toshikatsu Washio⁴, Masaki Misawa⁴, Naotaka Nitta⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Radiological Sciences, Graduate School of Human Health Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan University, 7-2-10, Higashiogu, Arakawa-ku, Tokyo 116-8551, Japan; Health Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-2-1, Namiki, Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki 305-8564, Japan; Office of Radiation Technology, Keio University Hospital, Shinanomachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 160-8582, Japan.
² Department of Radiological Sciences, Graduate School of Human Health Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan University, 7-2-10, Higashiogu, Arakawa-ku, Tokyo 116-8551, Japan; Health Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-2-1, Namiki, Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki 305-8564, Japan. Electronic address: t-numano@tmu.ac.jp.
³ Health Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-2-1, Namiki, Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki 305-8564, Japan; Department of Mechanical Engineering, Tokyo Denki University, 5, Senju Asahicho, Adachi-ku, Tokyo 120-8551, Japan.
⁴ Health Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-2-1, Namiki, Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki 305-8564, Japan.

PMID: 30171999
DOI: 10.1016/j.mri.2018.08.016

Abstract

Diffusion-magnetic resonance elastography (dMRE) is an emerging practical technique that can acquire diffusion magnetic resonance imaging and MRE simultaneously. However, a signal loss attributable to intravoxel phase dispersion (IVPD) interferes with the calculation of the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC). This study presents an approach to dMRE that reduces the influence of IVPD by introducing a new pulse sequence. The existing and proposed techniques were performed using a phantom comprising five rods with different elasticities at 60 Hz vibration to investigate the accuracy of previous and proposed dMRE techniques. The measures of ADC and stiffness, obtained by using both dMRE techniques, were compared with conventional spin-echo (SE) diffusion and SE-MRE. Then, we evaluated those differences by using the mean of absolute differences (MAD) in each rod within the phantom. The results of the MAD of the stiffness from both dMRE techniques showed almost no difference. In contrast, the value of the ADC MAD (MAD ≒ 0.16 × 10^-3 mm²/s), obtained in the soft region within the phantom with the previous dMRE technique, was large. This value was about 2.7 times that of the value produced by the proposed dMRE technique. This difference must reflect the degree of influence of IVPD in both techniques. These results demonstrate that our dMRE technique is a robust method for addressing the signal loss attributable to IVPD.

Keywords: Diffusion; Intravoxel phase dispersion; Magnetic resonance elastography; Quantitative MRI; Shear modulus; Stiffness.

MeSH terms

Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging / methods*
Elasticity Imaging Techniques / methods*
Humans
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted / methods*
Motion
Phantoms, Imaging
Reproducibility of Results
Stress, Mechanical