Effects of restricted diffusion in a biological phantom: a q-space diffusion MRI study of asparagus stems at a 3T clinical scanner

Abstract

The aim of this work was to study the effects of restricted diffusion in a biological phantom consisting of green asparagus stems using q-space MRI at a clinical scanner. Measurements of the full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the displacement distribution were performed with varied diffusion time (Td). The accuracy of the measurements was investigated with respect to the degree of violation of the short gradient pulse (SGP) condition, partial volume effects and a FWHM-based tensor model. The measurements showed a reasonably constant FWHM perpendicular to the capillaries in the vascular bundles and an increased FWHM parallel with the bundles when the Td was increased. A 15% decrease in FWHM perpendicular to the bundles was observed when the diffusion encoding duration was prolonged from 24 to 74 ms, owing to the violation of the SGP condition. For a population of different confinement sizes, simulations indicated that the FWHM reflects the smaller sizes rather then the mean size of the confinements. A new method allowing tensor analysis of FWHM was derived and yielded accurate results. In conclusion, we found it possible to measure the effects of restricted diffusion with q-space MRI using a clinical MRI scanner.