Modular and Open-Source Interactive Real-Time MRI

Motivation: Build a modular and extensible interactive real-time MRI system for clinical applications based on open-source software. Goal(s): Design a framework to interactively control reconstruction and acquisition parameters in real-time and add 3D visualizations of arbitrary slices. Approach: We extended BART to real-time reconstruction, integrated interactive control in a FLASH sequence, and built a real-time 3D visualization tool. The whole system was evaluated in an interactive cardiac study. Results: The proposed framework allows adjustments to slice position, frame rate, and image contrast in real-time and provides improved spatial understanding due to real-time 3D visualization in multi-slice measurements along arbitrary axes. Impact: We present a comprehensive interactive real-time MRI framework built from modular, open-source components and geared towards interventional MRI to facilitate the use of interactive real-time MRI in clinical applications.