MRI plays a key role in clinical disease diagnosis and life science research. Diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) is one of the most important imaging techniques in MRI. It has been widely used in clinics for diagnosis and in neuroimaging for fiber tracking and microstructure mapping. To detect micro-scale random motion of water molecules in DWI, single-shot EPI is widely used for signal acquisition due to its high acquisition speed and motion insensitivity. However, it suffers from the problems of low-resolution, geometric distortion and image blurring due to its low bandwidth along the phase-encoding direction and significant T2* decay during the EPI readout.
Dr. Guo and his team have been systematically developing a series of DWI methods to suppress or remove image distortion, increase in-plane and through-plane resolution, boost sampling efficiency and improve the new methods’ practicability. In particular, when reconstructing multi-shot diffusion images, phase variations are not treated as a source of imaging artifacts, but as a kind of image encoding. Similarly, field inhomogeneity induced phase can also be used for signal encoding. With these new reconstruction theories, signals can be significantly saved while image quality can be well maintained. By taking advantage of improved image quality, Dr. Guo is working on advanced fiber tracking algorithms and micro-structural information quantification now.
Dr. Guo is also interested in translational studies. Part of his techniques have been adopted by domestic MRI companies. At present, he and his team are working with companies clsoely to develop new interventional MRI scanners.
1.Simin Liu, Yuhui Xiong, Erpeng Dai, jJieying Zhang,Hua Guo*, lmproving Distortion Correction for lsotropicHigh-Resolution 3D Diffusion MRl by Optimizing Jacobian Modulation, Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, 2021
2.Erpeng Dai, Simin Liu,Hua Guo*, High-Resolution Whole-Brain Diffusion MRl at 3T Using Simultaneous Multislab (SMSlab) Acquisition, Neuroimage.2021
3.Sisi Li, Yishi Wang, Zhangxuan Hu, Li Guan, Yong Hai, Hanwen Zhang, Le He, Wen Jiang4,Hua Guo*, High.Fidelity Diffusion Tensor lmaging of the Cervical Spinal Cord Using Point-Spread-Function Encoded EPl,Neuroimage,2021,in press.
4.Diwei Shi, Ziyi Pan, Xuesong Li,Hua Guo*, Quanshui Zheng*,Diffusion coefficient orientation distributionfunction for diffusion magnetic resonance imaging, Journal of Neuroscience Methodsdoi:10.1016/i.ineumeth.2020.108986
5.jingwen Huang, Jun Shen, Qihua Yang , Ziliang Cheng, Xiaodong Chen, Taihui Yu, Jinglian Zhong, Yun Su, HuaGuo*, Biling Liang*, Quantification of pancreatic iron overload and fat infiltration and correlations with glucosedisturbance in pediatric thalassemia major patients. Quantitative lmaging in Medicine and Surgery 2020. doi.10.21037/qims-20-292
