Imaging Cardio-Mechanical Health

心力衰竭（HF）和冠心病（CHD）是主要的临床疾病，仅在英国就有270万人受到影响。这两种情况都会导致心肌有效泵送和输送血液到身体的能力根本性降低。虽然心脏中的这种缺陷很容易使用医学成像检测到，但就其对肌肉健康的影响而言，剖析心脏性能降低的原因仍然是心力衰竭治疗和患者治疗评估的公开挑战。成像心脏机械健康（ICMH）项目旨在通过开发心脏磁共振弹性成像（cMRE）直接测量心肌的健康来满足这一需求。使用最先进的磁共振成像和生物力学建模，该项目将提供一种新的非侵入性模式（cMRE），用于直接测量肌肉特性的变化，确定功能降低背后的机械病理生理学。该项目将新的成像序列与生物力学处理软件相结合，旨在使用3D打印和离体动物心脏模型系统地开发、验证和验证这些工具。在这些工程发展的基础上，通过ICMH项目开发的cMRE工具将应用于患者和志愿者，以说明这种新模式的潜力。

Heart failure (HF) and coronary heart disease (CHD) are major clinical conditions affecting an estimated 2.7M people in the UK alone. Both of these conditions result in a fundamental reduction in the ability of heart muscle to effectively pump and deliver blood to the body. While this deficiency in the heart is easily detected using medical imaging, dissecting the causes of reduced heart performance in terms of its implications for muscle health remain an open challenge for the treatment of heart failure and evaluation of patient treatment. The Imaging Cardiomechanical Health (ICMH) project aims to address this need by directly measuring the health of the heart muscle through the development of cardiac Magnetic Resonance Elastography (cMRE). Using state-of-the art magnetic resonance imaging and biomechanical modelling, this project will provide a novel noninvasive modality (cMRE) for directly measuring the alterations in muscle properties, determining the mechanical pathophysiology behind reduced function. Integrating new imaging sequences with biomechanical processing software, this project will aim to systematically develop, verify and validate these tools using 3D printed and ex vivo animal heart models. Building on these engineering developments, cMRE tools developed through the ICMH project will be applied in patients and volunteers to illustrate the potential of this new modality.