Quantitative MRI of the Spinal Cord

Table of Contents

1. Quantitative Biomarkers in the Spinal Cord: What For? 1.1 Rationale for Quantitative MRI of the Human Spinal Cord and Clinical Applications 1.2 Inflammatory Demyelinating Diseases 1.3A Acute SCI and Prognosis 1.3B Chronic SCI and Recovery

2. Physics of MRI 2.1 Array Coils 2.2 B0 Inhomogeneity and Shimming 2.3 Susceptibility Artifacts 2.4 Ultra-High Field

3. Imaging Spinal Cord Structure 3.1 Diffusion-Weighted Imaging 3.2 Q-Space Imaging 3.3 Model-Based Microstructure Imaging: A Future Perspective 3.4 Magnetization Transfer 3.5 T2 Relaxation 3.6 Atrophy

4. Imaging Spinal Cord Function 4.1 fMRI Using BOLD 4.2 Physiological Noise Modeling 4.3 Mapping the Vasculature of the Spinal Cord

5. Spectroscopy 5.1 Quantifying Metabolite Concentration

Annex: Anatomy of the Spinal Cord

Authors

Julien Cohen-Adad Institute of Biomedical Engineering, Polytechnique Montreal, and Functional Neuroimaging Unit, CRIUGM, Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada. Dr. Cohen-Adad is developing advanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques for quantitative assessment of the brain and spinal cord structure and function. These developments include hardware (coils), MRI sequences (relaxometry, diffusion tensor imaging, magnetization transfer, functional MRI) and software (multimodal registration, segmentation, motion correction, distortion correction, template creation). Between 2005 and 2008 he did his PhD at Université de Montréal (Canada) and Pitié-Salpétrière Hospital (Paris, France), during which he translated research protocols to clinics for the quantitative evaluation of chronic spinal cord injury and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients. Between 2009 and 2012, he did his postdoctoral fellowship at the MGH Martinos Center at Harvard University, aiming to further his expertise in Ultra-High Field MRI technology (7 Tesla) and coil building. Since his faculty appointment at Polytechnique Montreal in 2012, he has been pursuing these developments while setting up a lab environment for transferring knowledge to the local community. Claudia Wheeler-Kingshott University College London, Institute of Neurology, UK.