In vivo T2* weighted MRI visualizes cardiac lesions in murine models of acute and chronic viral myocarditis

作者：Xavier Helluy, Martina Sauter, Yuxiang Ye, Gunthard Lykowsky, Jakob Kreutner, Ali Yılmaz, Roland Jahns, Valérie Boivin, Reinhard Kandolf, Peter M. Jakob, Karl‐Heinz Hiller, Karin Klingel · 发表于：PLoS ONE · 年份：2017 · DOI：10.1371/journal.pone.0172084 · 被引用次数：13 · 研究领域：Viral Infections and Immunology Research、Integrated Circuits and Semiconductor Failure Analysis、Advanced MRI Techniques and Applications

OBJECTIVE: Acute and chronic forms of myocarditis are mainly induced by virus infections. As a consequence of myocardial damage and inflammation dilated cardiomyopathy and chronic heart failure may develop. The gold standard for the diagnosis of myocarditis is endomyocardial biopsies which are required to determine the etiopathogenesis of cardiac inflammatory processes. However, new non-invasive MRI techniques hold great potential in visualizing cardiac non-ischemic inflammatory lesions at high spatial resolution, which could improve the investigation of the pathophysiology of viral myocarditis. RESULTS: Here we present the discovery of a novel endogenous T2* MRI contrast of myocardial lesions in murine models of acute and chronic CVB3 myocarditis. The evaluation of infected hearts ex vivo and in vivo by 3D T2w and T2*w MRI allowed direct localization of virus-induced myocardial lesions without any MRI tracer or contrast agent. T2*w weighted MRI is able to detect both small cardiac lesions of acute myocarditis and larger necrotic areas at later stages of chronic myocarditis, which was confirmed by spatial correlation of MRI hypointensity in myocardium with myocardial lesions histologically. Additional in vivo and ex vivo MRI analysis proved that the contrast mechanism was due to a strong paramagnetic tissue alteration in the vicinity of myocardial lesions, effectively pointing towards iron deposits as the primary contributor of contrast. The evaluation of the biological origi...