Estimation of in vivo human myocardial fibre strain by integrating diffusion tensor and tagged MRI using FE modelling

In this study, we propose a methodology to estimate 3D+time maps of left ventricular fibre strain from human structural and dynamic MRI data. A finite element model integrates fibre principal direction throughout the left ventricle from an ex vivo human diffusion tensor MRI acquisition and motion from tagged MRI. This combination enables the estimation of fibre strain and its variation throughout the cardiac cycle. The long-term goal of this study is to apply this technique to an atlas of human fibre orientations and to investigate the importance of having subject-specific fibre orientation for fibre strain analysis.