Analysis Methods for Hyperpolarized Carbon ( 13 C) MRI of the Kidney.

Hyperpolarized ¹³ C MR is a novel medical imaging modality with substantially different signal dynamics as compared to conventional ¹ H MR, thus requiring new methods for processing the data in order to access and quantify the embedded metabolic and functional information. Here we describe step-by-step analysis protocols for functional renal hyperpolarized ¹³ C imaging. These methods are useful for investigating renal blood flow and function as well as metabolic status of rodents in vivo under various experimental physiological conditions.This chapter is based upon work from the COST Action PARENCHIMA, a community-driven network funded by the European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) program of the European Union, which aims to improve the reproducibility and standardization of renal MRI biomarkers. This analysis protocol chapter is complemented by two separate chapters describing the basic concept and experimental procedure.