Abstract #0300

Impact of Equilibrium Magnetization of Blood On ASL Quantification

Yufen Chen¹, Ze Wang^1,2, John A. Detre¹

¹Center for Functional Neuroimaging, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA; ²Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA

The equilibrium magnetization of blood (M0b) is an important factor for ASL quantification that is difficult to measure due to the low image resolution. In this study, we compared the quantification results of map-based and ratio-based M0b estimates. Although the gray matter cerebral blood flow (CBF) estimates were similar, map-based M0b reduced the gray to white matter contrast of the CBF maps unless tissue-specific partition coefficients are used. Ratio-based M0b methods are preferred but require accurate T2* and coil sensitivity correction for accurate CBF quantification.