Simon Richardson1, 2, Bernard Siow2, Andrew Batchelor3, Mark F. Lythgoe1, Daniel D.C. Alexander2
1UCL Centre for Advanced Biomedical Imaging, Division of Medicine and Institute of Child Health, University College London, London, United Kingdom; 2Centre for Medical Image Computing, Dept of Computer Science, University College London, London, United Kingdom; 3Wolfson Inst for Biomedical Research, University College London, London, United Kingdom
We have developed an MRI compatible isolated tissue maintenance chamber and tested its performance in maintaining rat optic nerve functionally and structurally for 10 hours. Electrophysiology, electron microscopy and detailed diffusion MRI have been used to assess the tissue stability within this system. The chamber is versatile, controllable and reliable and can be used with any horizontal bore MRI system. This is the first temporal validation of tissue functional, structural and MR stability in an MRI compatible isolated tissue system.