Aberdeen scientists are at the forefront of a new type of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), having built in-house the only two available prototypes of Fast Field-Cycling MRI in the world - and these already have clinical imaging capabilities. Fast Field-Cycling MRI switches rapidly over a range of field strengths (0.2 T to 200 µT), providing a T1 dispersion curve. This information is invisible to fixed-field scanners and uncovers unique knowledge about motion and interaction between component molecules within a tissue (i.e. water/fat/proteins). In this application the investigators wish to use their in-house expertise further to extend the capability of our Fast Field-Cycling MRI to perform cardiac imaging by building the first-ever cardiac Fast Field-Cycling MRI coil and develop cardiac pulse sequences with ECG gating. The investigators will aim to establish the normalcy of T1 dispersion curves for left ventricular myocardium in healthy volunteers, and further on to distinguish the characteristics of post-myocardial infarction scar T1 dispersion curves.
The main aim of the study is to build and test a cardiac-specific coil purposely assembled in house to suit the FFC-MRI whole-body prototype and to test if it could be used for clinical cardiac scans in human subject populations.