The Evaluation of Optic Nerves Using 7 Tesla “Silent” Zero Echo Time Imaging in Patients with Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy with or without Idebenone Treatment

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) of the Optic Nerve is difficult due to the fine extended nature of the structure, strong local magnetic field distortions induced by anatomy, and large motion artefacts associated with eye movement. To address these problems we used a Zero Echo Time (ZTE) MRI sequence with an Adiabatic SPectral Inversion Recovery (ASPIR) fat suppression pulse which also imbues the images with Magnetisation Transfer contrast. We investigated an application of the sequence for imaging the optic nerve in subjects with Leber’s hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON). Of particular note is the sequence’s near-silent operation, which can enhance image quality of the optic nerve by reducing the occurrence of involuntary saccades induced during Magnetic Resonance (MR) scanning.