Assessment of Rotator Cuff Muscle Fat and Fibrosis Using Quantitative UTE Magnetization Transfer Imaging and Modeling

At present, there is a lack of available tools to non-invasively evaluate rotator cuff muscle fibrosis. Prior studies have suggested that magnetization transfer measurements may be useful for quantifying collagen when acquired with an ultrashort echo time technique. However, the increased presence of fat after muscle injury may confound these measurements. In this study, a rat model of chronic massive rotator cuff tearing was used with UTE-T1 and UTE-MT mapping without and with fat suppression to show that muscle collagen and fibrosis could be quantified.