Our research focuses on developing a non-contrast MRI method, Displacement Spectrum Imaging (DiSpect), to trace blood flow sources using blood water as an endogenous MRI tracer. DiSpect is a generalization of the Displacement Encoding via Stimulated Echoes (DENSE), which encodes information on the source position of blood during spin-tagging. After some time (10 ms to ~3 seconds), the blood enters an imaging slice. Through repeated encoding that is cardiac gated, DiSpect can trace back blood sources for each image voxel. DiSpect has the unique ability to untangle complex flow patterns, even under very slow flow conditions, since even very slow flow would be displaced by a considerable amount during these long evolution times. We have demonstrated that DiSpect can probe both arterial sources and venous territories in-vivo.
Key Contributions
- Novel MRI Technique: Introduced Displacement Spectrum Imaging (DiSpect), a non-contrast MRI method that leverages blood water as an endogenous tracer to identify the source of blood flow
- Generalization of DENSE: Extended the principles of Displacement Encoding via Stimulated Echoes (DENSE) to encode the source position of blood at the time of spin tagging, enabling retrospective tracing of flow
- Cardiac-Gated Encoding: Implemented repeated, cardiac-synced encoding to trace sources over evolution times from milliseconds to seconds
- Robust to Slow Flow: Showed that DiSpect resolves complex patterns even under very slow flow by leveraging long displacement times
People
Zhiyong Zhang
Alumni
Related Publications
2025 | |
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MR perfusion source mapping depicts venous territories and reveals perfusion modulation during neural activationNature Communications, 2025 |
2021 | |
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Last updated: 2025-09-03