Motivation: Conventional electrocardiography (ECG) multi-electrode setups are essential for cardiac MR (CMR) gating, but they are cumbersome and pose electrical safety risks to patients. Goal(s): This study aims to investigate a feasible non-contact CMR gating approach using a MR-compatible doppler cardiac radar, and it can possibly offer improved patient comfort and flexibility. Approach: An 886 MHz microstrip-patch-based MR-compatible cardiac radar was proposed, optimized, and fabricated, and it worked with a home-made FPGA module to communicate with the scanner to achieve real-time cardiac triggering. Results: In-vivo scans validated the feasibility of the proposed approach, which was rigorously compared with CMR images via traditional ECG methods. Impact: The proposed cardiac radar provides a non-contact alternative for cardiac gating in MRI. Future research may explore signal biological mechanisms and its additional applications in respiratory gating.
Wu et al. (Tue,) studied this question.
Synapse has enriched 5 closely related papers on similar clinical questions. Consider them for comparative context: