Figure 8. Analysis of T₂ ^* across the cardiac cycle.

Synopsis of the evolution of mean T₂ ^* averaged over all subjects for standard mid-ventricular segments of the heart. T₂ ^* derived from each cardiac segment are plotted versus the cardiac cycle. T₂ ^* changes over the cardiac cycle. Averaging T₂ ^* over all mid-ventricular myocardial segments revealed that T₂ ^* increases approximately 27% between systole and diastole. Myocardial T₂ ^* was derived from MB CINE acquisitions. Prospective triggering was used which resulted in a gap at end-diastole of approximately 100 ms depending on the heart rate. For this reason the cardiac cycle is normalized for all subjects without including this gap.