The effect of AIF and tissue time-course temporal alignment on pharmacokinetic model trans-cytolemmal water exchange sensitivity

Using DCE modeling to quantify prostate transcytolemmal water exchange effect faces the challenges of often insufficient interstitial contrast agent concentration as well as suboptimal temporal resolution. Using ultra-high temporal resolution prostate DCE data, the goal of this work is to investigate the impact of DCE-MRI temporal alignment between the arterial input function (AIF) and the tissue time-courses on water exchange quantification. Results here show that when perfect alignment is not achievable in practice, an earlier AIF bolus arrival bias will generally reduce the capability for water-exchange quantification using DCE-MRI.