Effect of Gradient Resolution in Diffusion Tensor Imaging on the Appearance of Multiple Sclerosis Lesions at 3T

Mustafa Okan Irfanoglu¹, Raghu Machiraju¹, Michael V. Knopp¹, Steffen Sammet¹

Diffusion Tensor Imaging proved to be a useful modality for the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. However, the quality of the DTI-derived scalar maps and tractography is directly dependent on experimental design. In clinical settings, scan time is a major constraint and not many diffusion weighted volumes can be acquired. In this work, we analyze the effects of gradient resolution on the appearance of multiple sclerosis regions. Results indicate that with increasing number of gradients, statistics based on lesion scalar map distributions becomes more stable and spending extra minutes might be beneficial if DTI is to be assessed for diagnosis.