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This paper represents a preliminary study of the effects of regional temperature distribution in two-dimensional nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) T1 imaging. It is found, as expected, that variations in local temperature appear as variations in the corresponding T1 image. The potential use of NMR T1 imaging in temperature measurements is evaluated in the case of water and blood samples. Using containers where the temperature could be either known or directly controlled with reasonable accuracy, images are obtained with samples having at least two regions at different temperatures. As expected, T1 is found to vary linearly with 1/T over the range of 0 degrees C to about 40 degrees C for blood. The potential use of T1 imaging in hyperthermia applications is also discussed.

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Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) images of 93 patients undergoing studies of the abdomen and pelvis were studied for evidence of lesions of the aorta and the iliac and femoral arteries; atherosclerotic lesions were present in 13 of them. The lesions consisted of eccentric and concentric mural thickening with luminal narrowing and discrete plaques protruding into the vessel lumen. This appearance was distinctly different from the morphology of the internal vessel surface and uniformly thin vessel wall in normal patients and volunteers under the age of 30 years. Intraluminal flow signals observed in atherosclerotic and nonatherosclerotic subjects could be distinguished from mural lesions because of their lack of contiguity with the vessel wall and variation in appearance on multiple images obtained with the first and second spin echo. This initial experience suggests a potential role for NMR in the noninvasive imaging of atherosclerotic lesions. The natural contrast between flowing blood and the vessel wall indicates a distinct advantage of NMR for vascular imaging.