Impact of Acquisition Orientation on Whole Brain Metabolite Maps Obtained by Short Echo Time Echo Planar Spectroscopy Imaging (EPSI)

Angle Lecocq¹, Yann Le Fur¹, Andrew A. Maudsley², Sulaiman Sheriff², Mohammad Sabati², Virginie Callot³, Monique Bernard⁴, Maxime Guye¹, Jean-Philippe Ranjeva¹

One major MRSI limitation is the artifact related to magnetic susceptibility effects leading to metabolite map distortions and signal drop out. The use of a short echo time helps to reduce signal loss and minimize phase differences. This susceptibility artifact could also be minimized by the choice of the MRSI data orientation. We aimed here to evaluate the impact of MRSI orientation on quality of whole brain of major metabolites maps between acquisitions performed along the AC-PC line and along the AC-PC+15line using a recent whole brain MRSI sequence called Echo Planar Spectroscopy Imaging (EPSI) with short echo time (20ms).