Exploring NORDIC denoising benefits in high-resolution Arterial Spin Labeling MRI

Motivation: NORDIC PCA denoising is a recent denoising technique that promises mitigation of thermal noise in MRI data, and its application in high-resolution ASL remains unexplored. Goal(s): Assess the effectiveness of NORDIC denoising for improving the quality of high-resolution ASL perfusion signal. Approach: NORDIC denoising was applied to ASL data in two different approaches. NORDIC1, on control and label separately, and NORDIC2 on the original ASL time course (control and label combined). Results: NORDIC denoising results in a twofold increase in tSNR. The denoising effect is most effective when NORDIC is applied to ASL timeseries and in low SNR voxels. Impact: ASL is often not utilized in clinical and cognitive neuroscience studies due to its low SNR. Thus, the improvement in tSNR afforded by NORDIC denoising paves the way for the implementation of high-resolution ASL in cutting-edge brain studies.