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Abstract #0275

Direct Elastography of In Vivo Human Heart

Heiko Tzschtzsch1, Thomas Elgeti1, Sebastian Hirsch1, Thoralf Niendorf2, Jrgen Braun3, Ingolf Sack1

1Department of Radiology, Charit University Medicine, Berlin, Germany; 2Berlin Ultrahigh Field Facility, Charit University Medicine, Berlin, Germany; 3Institute of Medical Informatics, Charit University Medicine, Berlin, Germany


The variation of myocardial elasticity enables the heart to circulate blood through the cardiovascular system. Thus, measurement of heart elasticity by elastography techniques may play a key role in the diagnosis of cardiac dysfunction. This paper presents a novel approach in cardiac MR elastography. The method relies on shear waves with amplitudes in the order of the in-plane resolution of vibration-synchronized MRI. Wall oscillations in the heart can directly be monitored in magnitude images without the need of specialized motion encoding gradients and phase unwrapping algorithms.