Arterial transit time (ATT) prolongation causes an error of cerebral blood flow (CBF) measurement during arterial spin labeling (ASL). To improve the accuracy of ATT and CBF in patients with prolonged ATT, we propose a robust ATT and CBF estimation method for clinical practice. The proposed method consists of a three‐delay Hadamard‐encoded pseudo‐continuous ASL (H‐pCASL) with an additional‐encoding and single‐delay with long‐labeled long‐delay (1dLLLD) acquisition. The additional‐encoding allows for the reconstruction of a single‐delay image with long‐labeled short‐delay (1dLLSD) in addition to the normal Hadamard sub‐bolus images. Five different images (normal Hadamard 3 delay, 1dLLSD, 1dLLLD) were reconstructed to calculate ATT and CBF. A Monte Carlo simulation and an in vivo study were performed to access the accuracy of the proposed method in comparison to normal 7‐delay (7d) H‐pCASL with equally divided sub‐bolus labeling duration (LD). The simulation showed that the accuracy of CBF is strongly affected by ATT. It was also demonstrated that underestimation of ATT and CBF by 7d H‐pCASL was higher with longer ATT than with the proposed method. Consistent with the simulation, the 7d H‐pCASL significantly underestimated the ATT compared to that of the proposed method. This underestimation was evident in the distal anterior cerebral artery (ACA; P = 0.0394) and the distal posterior cerebral artery (PCA; 2 P = 0.0255). Similar to the ATT, the CBF was underestimated with 7d H‐pCASL in the distal ACA (P = 0.0099), distal middle cerebral artery (P = 0.0109), and distal PCA (P = 0.0319) compared to the proposed method. Improving the SNR of each delay image (even though the number of delays is small) is crucial for ATT estimation. This is opposed to acquiring many delays with short LD. The proposed method confers accurate ATT and CBF estimation within a practical acquisition time in a clinical setting.

Our aim in this study was to determine an optimal delay time of hepatic arterial phase (HAP) imaging of hypervascular hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) in dynamic contrast-enhanced MDCT (DCE-CT) by use of the bolus-tracking method. The time-enhancement curves (TECs) of the aorta and the contrast of the hepatic arterial and portal system (APC) in the pharmacokinetic analysis were calculated. The clinical study included 41 patients with known or suspected HCC who underwent DCE-CT. The TECs of the aorta and the tumor-liver contrast (TLC) in the clinical study were calculated. On pharmacokinetic analysis, the peak aortic enhancement and the peak APC simulated under conditions of an injection duration of 30 s and an iodine load of 500 mg I/kg body weight were observed 18.5 and 22.5 s, respectively, after the trigger threshold (increased CT value 100 Hounsfield units), respectively. In the clinical study, the peak aortic enhancement and the peak TLC were observed 17.2 and 24.8 s after the trigger threshold, respectively. The optimal delay times until peak aortic enhancement and peak HAP were 15-17 and 19-21 s after the trigger threshold, respectively, under the following conditions: injection dose, 500 mg I/kg body weight; injection duration, 30 s; acquisition time, 5 s; and the trigger threshold. In addition, the peak TLC was achieved 4-7 s after the time to peak aortic enhancement.

Purpose: To clarify the type of spin compartment in arterial spin labeling (ASL) that is eliminated by delays alternating with nutation for tailored excitation (DANTE) pulse using T 2 -relaxometry, and to demonstrate the feasibility of arterial cerebral blood volume (CBV a ) imaging using DANTE-ASL in combination with a simplified two-compartment model. Method:The DANTE and T 2 -preparation modules were combined into a single ASL sequence. T 2 values under the application of DANTE were determined to evaluate changes in T 2 , along with the post-labeling delay (PLD) and the relationship between transit time without DANTE (TT noVS ) and T 2 . The reference tissue

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