Spins in motion. new methods for the visualization of intracranial flow

Magnetic resonance imaging has become a widely used imaging technique for diagnostic purposes, with applications in the whole human body. For many pathologies of the central nervous system, it is in fact the method of choice, due to high soft tissue contrast and the possibilities of generating images related to organ function rather than pure morphology.
In this thesis, the focus will be on methods designed to deal with a specific aspect of the central nervous system, which is the circulation of fluids (blood and cerebrospinal fluid) inside the skull. These two fluid compartments interact with each other, and a disease affecting one has good chances of affecting the other as well. This is the reason why the thesis is divided in two parts: the first part, titled angiography, is mainly related to the visualization of arteries and veins by means of angiographic sequences, and to the presentation of a novel method to enhance the visualization of datasets, by including the functional information deriving from time-resolved angiography into a single color-coded set of images. The second part, titled Flow quantification, is presenting a new bSSFP-based method for 3D time-resolved acquisition of quantitative flow information. This technique can be used for blood flow assessment, but it is especially suited for the measurement of cerebrospinal fluid. In the end, preliminary clinical results from a clinical study that applies this quantification technique to flow inside the cerebral ventricles are presented.