Carotid Artery Disease and Stroke: Assessing Risk with Vessel Wall MRI
Figure 6
Illustration of vasa vasorum imaging via dynamic contrast-enhanced (DCE) MRI. Time series of images after injection of gadolinium contrast agents (a) are used in a kinetic model to create parametric images (b) of partial plasma volume (top left) and transfer constant (bottom left). These may be fused into the color coded image at right (arrows indicate adventitia, J: jugular vein). Sample intensity versus time curves (c) shows the actual (dotted) and modeled (solid) curves for the pixels indicated in (b) and the selection of representative blood curves (green), used in the model, from candidates. Reproduced with permission from [109].
