Evaluation of MRIS of the brain with respect to SNR, CNR and GWR in young versus old subjects

During healthy aging, the brain undergoes several structural changes which introduce prominent low contrast on the MR images. In this study, the low contrast effects causing segmentation problems were analyzed in the context of image quality ratios such as signal to noise, contrast to noise and gray white intensity: SNR, CNR, GWR. The evaluation of the T₁-weighted MPRAGE and SE scans was conducted across ages. Also by collecting multiple FLASH images with varying flip angles for estimation of T₁, the differences in T₁ value between young and old population are determined. As a result, it´s observed that SE images have the best values in SNR metrics. However, it´s found that T₁ estimated images are superior in CNR and GWR metrics.