Amit Ailiani1, Thomas Neuberger2, Gino Banco3, James Brasseur3, Nadine Smith1, Andrew Webb4
1Bioengineering, Penn State University, University Park, PA, USA; 2Huck Institute, Penn State University, USA; 3Mechanical Engineering, Penn State University; 4Radiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands
Non-invasive dynamic MRI in the jejunum region of an anesthetized rat has been used to produce spatiotemporal maps representing peristaltic and segmental motions. Frequency analysis of these motions give results which are in good agreement with previous work which has all been performed using highly invasive techniques involving external isolation of the gut. Dynamic MRI provides quantitative information on many physiological parameters such propagation velocity, wavelength, speed of collapse and the period of the motilities. Physiological parameters which are not dependent upon the exact position of the MRI slice were found to be statistically the same between animals (n=6).