Assessment of Malignancy in Human Brain Tumors by in vivo 1H MR Spectroscopy at 3 Tesla

  • Choe, Bo-Young (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea) ;
  • Baik, Hyun-Man (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea) ;
  • Chu, Myung-Ja (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea) ;
  • Kwon, Kang-Sei (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea) ;
  • Chung, Sung-Taek (Medinus Co. LTD. Korea) ;
  • Oh, Chang-Hyun (Department of Electronics and Information Engineering, Korea University) ;
  • Kim, Sun-I (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Hanyang University) ;
  • Park, Chi-Bong (College of Veterinary Medicine, Kon-Kuk University) ;
  • Lee, Hyoung-Koo (Departments of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea)
  • Published : 2002.11.01

Abstract

Purpose: Three tesla high field MR has been important to those disciplines that are SNR limited, such as MR spectroscopy. Additionally, increased spectral dispersion is critical for minimizing spectral overlap and simplifying resonance structures. The purpose of this study was to assess clinical proton MR spectroscopy (MRS) as a noninvasive method for evaluating brain tumor malignancy at 3T high field system Materials and Methods: Using 3T MRI/MRS system, localized water-suppressed single-voxel technique in patients with brain tumors was employed to evaluate spectra with peaks of N-acetyl aspartate (NAA), choline-containing compounds (Cho), creatine/phosphocreatine (Cr) and lactate. On the basis of Cr, these peak areas were quantificated as a relative ratio.

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