• Longchuan Li, Mark Doyle, Geetha Rayarao, Robert W W Biederman, and Andreas Anayiotos.
• Biomedical Imaging Technology Center, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
• J Magn Reson Imaging. 2008 Apr 1; 27 (4): 898-907.

PurposeTo use numerical simulation and experimental approaches to introduce a novel phase contrast magnetic resonance (PC-MR) data processing technique termed Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR, with potential to improve accuracy, temporal resolution, and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of PC-MR data.Materials And MethodsComputational fluid dynamics data were generated for a two-chamber orifice flow model simulating valvular regurgitation. The numerical results were validated and used to simulate conventional and Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR data acquisitions. Common data sets were processed using conventional and Sparse Interleaved Referencing approaches and quantitative errors in velocity-time waveforms were measured and compared. In vitro phantom jet flow data and in vivo ascending aorta data were acquired and used to simulate Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR.ResultsThe Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR data showed significantly better representation of the velocity-time waveform in three areas: (i) lower root-mean-square errors (9.0 +/- 1.0% versus 24.0 +/- 0.2%; P < 0.005), (ii) simulation of conventionally processed data showed a pattern of peak velocity overestimation, which was experimentally demonstrated in in vitro data, whereas overestimation of peak velocity was dramatically attenuated using Sparse Interleaved Referencing (2.8 +/- 0.4% versus 16.9 +/- 6.4%, P < 0.005), and (iii) compared with the conventional scan, an average of 119.4 +/- 26.6% (P < 0.005) SNR was realized in in vitro and in vivo Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR data.ConclusionSimulation and in vitro/in vivo results show that Sparse Interleaved Referencing PC-MR processed data in pulsatile and jet flow showed higher accuracy, better peak velocity representation, and improved SNR compared with the data processed using the conventional PC-MR method.(c) 2008 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

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