Intravascular BOLD signal characterization of balanced SSFP experiments in human blood at high to ultrahigh fields

Purpose To investigate the intravascular contribution to the overall balanced SSFP (bSSFP) BOLD effect in human blood at high to ultrahigh field strengths (3 T, 9.4 T, and 14.1 T). Methods Venous blood prepared at two different oxygenation levels (deoxygenated: Y approximate to 71%, oxygenated: Y approximate to 94%) was measured with phase-cycled bSSFP for varying TRs/flip angles at 3 T, 9.4 T, and 14.1 T. The oxygen sensitivity was analyzed by intrinsic MIRACLE (motion-insensitive rapid configuration relaxometry)-R-2 estimation and passband signal differences. The intravascular BOLD-related signal change was extracted from the measured data for microvasculature and macrovasculature, and compared with the extravascular contribution obtained by Monte Carlo simulations. Results The MIRACLE-R-2 values showed a characteristic increase with longer TRs in deoxygenated blood, corroborating that SE-R-2 data cannot be used to assess the intravascular bSSFP BOLD effect. Passband bSSFP signal differences measured at optimal flip angles of 30 degrees at 3 T and 20 degrees at 9.4 T/14.1 T revealed considerable relative intravascular contributions of 95%/70% at 3 T, 74%/43% at 9.4 T, 66%/46% at 14.1 T for TR = 5 ms, and 90%/65% at 3 T, 36%/27% at 9.4 T, 13%/15% at 14.1 T for TR = 10 ms in macrovascular/microvascular regimes. Conclusion The results indicate that intravascular effects have to be considered to better understand the origin of bSSFP BOLD contrast in functional MRI experiments, especially at short TRs. The MIRACLE-R-2 method demonstrated the ability to quantify the apparent decrease in R-2 due to rapid RF refocusing.