Cardiac MRI Reconstruction for Severe Arrhythmia

The technology provides retrospective cardiac MRI reconstruction methods that use self-gating and non-cartesian sampling to image multiple beat morphologies in severe arrhythmia.
Problem:
Cardiac MRI image quality is compromised in patients with severe arrhythmias. ECG-gated retrospective CINE imaging can reject useful data, prolong scans, or introduce artifacts. Real-time MRI also lacks comparable spatial and temporal resolution. A method is needed to reconstruct high-resolution cardiac images despite irregular beat patterns.
Solution:
The technology acquires MRI data that can generate low-spatial, high-temporal resolution images. Image processing creates a cardiac phase signal used for arrhythmia detection and cardiac phase sorting. The cardiac phase information is then used for retrospective gated reconstruction. This approach supports reconstruction across different beat morphologies in subjects with severe arrhythmias.
Technology:
The technology uses non-cartesian sampling trajectories, including golden angle radial sampling, to reconstruct undersampled cardiac datasets. Cardiac phase can be estimated from left ventricular segmentation, ventricular width, myocardial thickness, or image similarity metrics. The method sorts data by beat type and cardiac phase before reconstruction. It can separately reconstruct normal, ectopic, and interrupted beat morphologies from the same dataset.
Advantages:

• Reconstructs cardiac images in subjects with severe arrhythmias
• Separates and reconstructs different beat morphologies
• Uses image-based self-gating instead of relying only on ECG signals
• Supports high-resolution reconstruction from undersampled non-cartesian data

Applications:

• Cardiac Imaging: The technology reconstructs high-resolution cardiac MRI images in subjects with severe arrhythmias.
• Beat Morphology Analysis: The technology separately reconstructs normal, ectopic, and interrupted cardiac beats from one dataset.
• MRI Signal Processing: The technology uses image-derived cardiac phase signals for retrospective gated reconstruction.
• Cardiac Function Assessment: The technology supports visualization of systolic and diastolic motion across different beat morphologies.

Intellectual Property:

• US 10,588,511

Stage of Development:

• Prototype

Desired Partnerships:

• Licensing
• Research Collaboration

Reference Media:

Contijoch et al., J Cardiovasc Magn Reson 2015 May 21; 17(21): 37
DOI 10.1186/s12968-015-0146-9




Schematic of MRI reconstruction algorithm
Docket: 14-7100