Motion and distortion-robust quantitative MRI of early brain developments - Motion and distortion-robust quantitative MRI of early brain developments The objective of this research is to significantly enhance quantitative imaging technology for in-vivo analysis of neurovascular structures and the early developing brain's response to perinatal stroke. Quantitative MRI (qMRI) is becoming essential in neuroimaging, offering superior capabilities over qualitative MRI. Specifically, quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) and R2* mapping provide early insights into developmental abnormalities such as brain hemosiderin deposits, intracranial hemorrhage, and blood oxygenation levels. However, quantitative perinatal MRI faces significant challenges: 1) fetal motion restricts imaging to 2D and often introduces artifacts, and 2) geometric and field distortions are amplified by fetal and maternal organ movements. Currently, our understanding of early brain development and common neurodevelopmental abnormalities is primarily derived from postmortem (in-vitro) studies due to the lack of advanced quantitative imaging technology. This project aims to bridge these gaps by developing an innovative, motion- and distortion-robust quantitative MRI technique. This involves creating and evaluating a novel approach based on 3D motion-robust radial multi-echo MRI combined with advanced image processing and reconstruction techniques. These methods will correct for motion and reconstruct high-resolution quantitative data directly from the data space, allowing detailed visualization of the neurovascular structure in small fetal and neonatal brains. The project has three specific aims: 1) improving neonatal quantitative MRI for moving subjects, and 2) achieving high-resolution susceptibility-weighted, quantitative susceptibility and R2* maps in the developing brain despite subject movements 3) quantitative evaluations of the proposed approach against Echo planar imaging-based approaches on healthy and patients with perinatal stroke. This research is significant because it enables high-resolution in-vivo mapping of the neurovascular structure in the fetal brain despite motion, simplifies MRI research for neonates and preterm infants with motion-robust acquisition and reconstruction techniques that compensate for small head movements, reduces the need for sedation and anesthesia in clinical MRI of neonates and uncooperative patients, corrects motion while increasing the spatial resolution of quantitative MRI, thereby dramatically improving the analysis of neural structure and connectivity in early brain development.
