Spatial profiling of parameters derived from diffusion weighted magnetic resonance imaging in the healthy human kidney

Motivation: Kidney microstructure has received relatively less attention compared to other organs due to EPI artifacts convolved with motion and cardiac pulsatility. Recently, mitigations of these artifacts have enabled more microstructural explorations of the kidney. Goal(s): The study aimed at deriving estimates of microstructure and microcirculation from the perspective of concentric layers segmentations. Approach: We scrutinized the dependence of renal DWI parameters from conventional representations (DTI, IVIM), an advanced hybrid DTI-IVIM approach and a multiple encoded FC-IVIM model on concentric layers. Results: The most significant layer dependence was observed for pseudodiffusion parameters and structural fractional anisotropy, with weaker dependences observed for structural diffusivity parameters. Impact: Potential extrapolations to kidney microstructure using in vivo MRI could be highly impactful in the study of renal dysfunction.