Magnetic resonance angiography of the mouse cerebrovascular system at 17.6 T

Introduction Many neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s disease are linked to abnormalities in vascular system. Visualization of the changes in vascular structure is important for early diagnosis and treatment. Blood vessels can be imaged non-invasively by magnetic resonance angiography (MRA) [1]. In this technique shortening of the effective T1 of moving blood provides the vessel contrast with stationary tissue [2]. Improvement of this technique by increasing the vessels contrast and signal to noise ratio is possible by using higher magnetic fields [3]. In this study we investigated the feasibility of performing 3D time-of-flight magnetic resonance angiography (3D TOF MRA) at 17.6T to image the cerebral vasculature of mouse. Our results show that MRA significantly benefits from ultra high magnetic field (17.6 T) especially to visualize smaller vessels.