Chinese Journal of Magnetic Resonance

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Lung MRI Using Hyperpolarized Gases

LI Hai-dong1,2,ZHANG Zhi-ying1,2,HAN Ye-qing1,SUN Xian-ping1,ZHOU Xin1*   

  1. 1. State Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance and Atomic and Molecular Physics, Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance in Biological Systems, National Center for Magnetic Resonance in Wuhan(Wuhan Institute of Physics and Mathematics, Chinese Academy of Sciences), Wuhan 430071, China;
    2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
  • Received:2014-02-18 Revised:2014-07-18 Online:2014-09-05 Published:2014-09-05
  • About author:*Corresponding author:ZHOU Xin, Tel: 027-87198802, E-mail: xinzhou@wipm.ac.cn.
  • Supported by:

    国家自然科学基金资助项目(81227902),中国科学院“百人计划”资助项目([2010]88),中国科学院知识创新工程重要方向资助项目(KJCX2-EW-N06).

Abstract:

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a nonradioactive and noninvasive medical imaging technique, and it has been widely applied in the clinical diagnosis. However, using conventional proton MRI to obtain lung images is difficult, because the proton density in the lungs is about three orders of magnitude lower than that in other organs/tissues due to air cavities in the lungs. Hyperpolarized noble gases can be used as contrast agents for lung MRI. Spin-exchange optical pumping (SEOP) is a technique that can be used to enhance the nuclear spin polarizations of noble gases more than 10 000 folds, which makes noble gas lung MRI feasible. In this paper, the recent developments of hyperpolarized gases lung MRI were reviewed. Topics covered include comparison of different hyperpolarized noble gases used for lung MRI, unconventional methods for measuring quantitative parameters in hyperpolarized gas MRI, and the most updated applications of hyperpolarized gas MRI in assessing pulmonary structure and function.

Key words: lung, hyperpolarized gases, spin-exchange optical pumping, MRI

CLC Number: