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Abstract #2482

Differentiation of Fe2+ and Fe3+ with Iron-Sensitive MRI

Olaf Dietrich1, Johannes Levin2, Armin Giese3, Annika Plate2, Kai Btzel2, Maximilian F. Reiser, 1, Birgit Ertl-Wagner

1Josef Lissner Laboratory for Biomedical Imaging, Institute for Clinical Radiology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Hospital Munich, Munich, Germany; 2Department of Neurology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Hospital Munich, Munich, Germany; 3Center for Neuropathology and Prion Research, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Hospital Munich, Munich, Germany


The purpose of the present study is to demonstrate the different behaviors of ferric and ferrous iron ions in MRI and to suggest a technique to differentiate quantitatively between both forms of iron in tissue. A phantom consisting of tubes with different concentrations of ferrous and ferric chloride solutions was examined on a 3-Tesla MRI system. A multi-echo gradient-echo was used for both T2* and quantitative susceptibility measurements. Ferrous and ferric chloride show markedly different relaxation behaviors in MRI, but similar influences on the susceptibility. These properties can be used to differentiate ferrous and ferric samples.