Identification of cardiac phase in hyperpolarized 13C cardiac MRI using multiphase 1H MRI and unitized 3D patch-based reconstruction

Motivation: The predetermined trigger delay may fail to acquire 13C images at an unstable heart rate and cause a misalignment between the cardiac phases depicted in structural and metabolic images. Goal(s): Aim to exploit the volumetric PBSR algorithm to establish an automated alignment workflow to identify the actual cardiac phase for HP 13C images. Approach: Image pairs of multiple 1H cardiac phases and single-phase 13C images will be reconstructed by 3D PBSR, and the pair with the best similarity/in-focus index will be elected. Results: The digital phantom and an in-vivo HP 13C cardiac image demonstrated the feasibility of cardiac phase detection. Impact: The currently proposed automated alignment workflow identifies the actual cardiac phase when the HP 13C images are acquired, and this technique will potentially benefit patients with arrhythmia or pediatric populations.