Breathing deformation model -- application to multi-resolution abdominal MRI

TL;DR

This paper presents a method to generate high-resolution dynamic MRI images of the abdomen by applying deformation models derived from low-resolution images to previously acquired high-resolution images, enabling detailed imaging of physiological changes.

Contribution

The study introduces a novel approach to produce high-resolution dynamic MRI by applying deformation models from low-resolution images to high-resolution data, improving imaging of physiological motion.

Findings

Deformation models can be computed from low-resolution images.

Applied deformation models successfully generate high-resolution images of different breathing phases.

Method enhances dynamic MRI resolution without requiring high-resolution acquisition at each phase.

Abstract

Dynamic MRI is a technique of acquiring a series of images continuously to follow the physiological changes over time. However, such fast imaging results in low resolution images. In this work, abdominal deformation model computed from dynamic low resolution images have been applied to high resolution image, acquired previously, to generate dynamic high resolution MRI. Dynamic low resolution images were simulated into different breathing phases (inhale and exhale). Then, the image registration between breathing time points was performed using the B-spline SyN deformable model and using cross-correlation as a similarity metric. The deformation model between different breathing phases were estimated from highly undersampled data. This deformation model was then applied to the high resolution images to obtain high resolution images of different breathing phases. The results indicated that the deformation model could be computed from relatively very low resolution images.