• Investigative Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.218-228
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• 2018

Purpose: The objective of this study is to determine the effect of physical changes on MR temperature imaging at 7.0T and to examine proton-resonance-frequency related changes of MR phase images and T1 related changes of MR magnitude images, which are obtained for MR thermometry at various magnetic field strengths. Materials and Methods: An MR-compatible capacitive-coupled radio-frequency hyperthermia system was implemented for heating a phantom and swine muscle tissue, which can be used for both 7.0T and 3.0T MRI. To determine the effect of flip angle correction on T1-based MR thermometry, proton resonance frequency, apparent T1, actual flip angle, and T1 images were obtained. For this purpose, three types of imaging sequences are used, namely, T1-weighted fast field echo with variable flip angle method, dual repetition time method, and variable flip angle method with radio-frequency field nonuniformity correction. Results: Signal-to-noise ratio of the proton resonance frequency shift-based temperature images obtained at 7.0T was five-fold higher than that at 3.0T. The T1 value increases with increasing temperature at both 3.0T and 7.0T. However, temperature measurement using apparent T1-based MR thermometry results in bias and error because B1 varies with temperature. After correcting for the effect of B1 changes, our experimental results confirmed that the calculated T1 increases with increasing temperature both at 3.0T and 7.0T. Conclusion: This study suggests that the temperature-induced flip angle variations need to be considered for accurate temperature measurements in T1-based MR thermometry.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Visualization
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.26-37
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• 2020

Magnetic resonance thermometry (MRT) is a technique capable of measuring three-dimensional mean temperature fields by utilizing temperature-dependent shifts in proton resonance frequency. In this study, experimental verification of the technique is obtained by measuring 3D temperature fields within fully developed turbulent pipe flow, using 3T and 7T MRI scanners. The effect of the proton resonance frequency (PRF) thermal constant is examined in detail.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.241-250
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• 2015

Noninvasive temperature monitoring is feasible with Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) based on temperature sensitive MR parameters such as $T_1$ and $T_2$ relaxation times, Proton Resonance Frequency shift (PRFs), diffusion, exchange process, magnetization transfer contrast, chemical exchange saturation transfer, etc. While the temperature monitoring is very useful to guide the thermal treatment such as RF hyperthermia or thermal ablation, the optimization of the MR thermometry method is essential because the range of temperature measurement depends on the choice of the measurement methods. Useful temperature range depends on the purpose of treatment methods, for example, $42^{\circ}C$ to $45^{\circ}C$ for RF hyperthermia and over $50^{\circ}C$ for thermal ablation. In this paper, MR thermometry methods using $T_1$ and $T_2$ relaxation times and PRFs-based MR thermometry are tried on a 3.0 T MRI system and their results are reported and compared. In addition, the scanning protocol and temperature calculation algorithms from $T_1$ and $T_2$ relaxation times and PRFs are optimized for the different temperature ranges for the purpose of RF hyperthermia and/or thermal ablation.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetic Resonance Society
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.64-72
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• 2007

[ $^1H$ ] nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiments have been performed at 30 - 300 K and 7 T to investigate dynamics of hydrogen bond network in the single crystal $(NH_4)_3H(SO_4)_2$. The two proton sites, ammonium proton and hydrogen-bond proton, are identified from the $^1H$ NMR MAS spectrum at 340 K. As temperature decreases, the $^1H$ NMR spectrum shifts to the higher frequency side with a larger linewidth. The spectrum at 65 K shows a distinctive change in line shape toward the ferroelectric transition at 63 K. The measured values of $T_1$ for ammonium and hydrogen-bond protons are similar in the whole range of temperature. $T_1$ of $^1H$ NMR shows a gradual decrease down to 120 K and starts to steeply increase below 100 K. Then $T_1$ shows abrupt decrease below 70 K with a sharp minimum at 63 K, where the ferroelectric transition occurs. This temperature dependence of spectrum and $T_1$ clearly prove that the large change in the dynamics of hydrogen bond network is associated with the ferroelectric phase transition at 63 K.

• Investigative Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.98-107
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• 2006

Magnetization Transfer (MT) imaging generates contrast dependent on the phenomenon of magnetization exchange between free water proton and restricted proton in macromolecules. In biological materials in knee, MT or cross-relaxation is commonly modeled using two spin pools identified by their different T2 relaxation times. Two models for cross-relaxation emphasize the role of proton chemical exchange between protons of water and exchangeable protons on macromolecules, as well as through dipole-dipole interaction between the water and macromolecule protons. The most essential tool in medical image manipulation is the ability to adjust the contrast and intensity. Thus, it is desirable to adjust the contrast and intensity of an image interactively in the real time. The proton density (PD) and T2-weighted SE MR images allow the depiction of knee structures and can demonstrate defects and gross morphologic changes. The PD- and T2-weighted images also show the cartilage internal pathology due to the more intermediate signal of the knee joint in these sequences. Suppression of fat extends the dynamic range of tissue contrast, removes chemical shift artifacts, and decreases motion-related ghost artifacts. Like fat saturation, phase sensitive methods are also based on the difference in precession frequencies of water and fat. In this study, phase sensitive methods look at the phase difference that is accumulated in time as a result of Larmor frequency differences rather than using this difference directly. Although how MT work was given with clinical evidence that leads to quantitative model for MT in tissues, the mathematical formalism used to describe the MT effect applies to explaining to evaluate knee disorder, such as anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear and meniscal tear. Calculation of the effect of the effect of the MT saturation is given in the magnetization transfer ratio (MTR) which is a quantitative measure of the relative decrease in signal intensity due to the MT pulse.

• Investigative Magnetic Resonance Imaging
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.131-141
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• 2008

Purpose : To investigate the feasibility and accuracy of Proton Resonance Frequency (PRF) shift based magnetic resonance (MR) temperature mapping utilizing the self-developed center array-sequencing phase unwrapping (PU) method for non-invasive temperature monitoring. Materials and Methods : The computer simulation was done on the PU algorithm for performance evaluation before further application to MR thermometry. The MR experiments were conducted in two approaches namely PU experiment, and temperature mapping experiment based on the PU technique with all the image postprocessing implemented in MATLAB. A 1.5T MR scanner employing a knee coil with $T2^*$ GRE (Gradient Recalled Echo) pulse sequence were used throughout the experiments. Various subjects such as water phantom, orange, and agarose gel phantom were used for the assessment of the self-developed PU algorithm. The MR temperature mapping experiment was initially attempted on the agarose gel phantom only with the application of a custom-made thermoregulating water pump as the heating source. Heat was generated to the phantom via hot water circulation whilst temperature variation was observed with T-type thermocouple. The PU program was implemented on the reconstructed wrapped phase images prior to map the temperature distribution of subjects. As the temperature change is directly proportional to the phase difference map, the absolute temperature could be estimated from the summation of the computed temperature difference with the measured ambient temperature of subjects. Results : The PU technique successfully recovered and removed the phase wrapping artifacts on MR phase images with various subjects by producing a smooth and continuous phase map thus producing a more reliable temperature map. Conclusion : This work presented a rapid, and robust self-developed center array-sequencing PU algorithm feasible for the application of MR temperature mapping according to the PRF phase shift property.