Comparison of Pulmonary Nodule Morphology on Pre-Contrast and Delayed Post-Contrast Stack-of-Spirals Ultrashort Echo Time MRI.
6 affiliations
- 1Department of Radiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, China.
- 2Department of Radiology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430022, China.
- 3General Hospital of the Yangtze River Shipping, Wuhan Brain Hospital, Wuhan 430022, China.
- 4MR Collaborations, Siemens Healthineers Ltd., Chengdu 610000, China.
- 5MR Application Predevelopment, Siemens Healthcare Ltd., 91052 Erlangen, Germany.
- 6Clinical & Technical Support, Philips Healthcare, Beijing 100600, China.
Abstract
Background: Stack-of-spirals ultrashort TE (spiral-UTE) MRI has shown promise for radiation-free pulmonary nodule detection, and previous studies have reported closely matched observed pulmonary nodule detection rates between contrast-enhanced (UTEe) and unenhanced (UTEu) acquisitions. However, whether this performance extends to detailed lesion-level morphological characterization and whether delayed post-contrast spiral-UTE provides additional morphological information compared with the pre-contrast acquisition under the clinical imaging protocol remain incompletely understood. Therefore, this study compared UTEu and UTEe for lesion-level morphological assessment using CT as the reference standard. Methods: A total of 61 patients with pulmonary nodules/masses (>5 mm) identified on chest CT were enrolled. Patients underwent spiral-UTE MRI on either a 1.5 T scanner (27 patients, 63 lesions) or a 3.0-T scanner (34 patients, 101 lesions). Two fixed consensus reader panels with different experience profiles evaluated lesion visualization and detailed morphological features separately on sequential pre-contrast UTEu and delayed post-contrast UTEe. Two complementary morphology analyses were performed. First, end-to-end successful characterization was assessed across all CT-detected eligible lesions; for each feature, successful characterization required both lesion visualization on the corresponding UTE acquisition and correct feature classification relative to CT. Nonvisualized lesions were designated not characterizable and therefore unsuccessful for this composite outcome. Second, conditional sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy were evaluated among lesions visualized on both UTEu and UTEe to compare morphology interpretation after successful lesion visualization. Lesion size agreement, contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), and edge sharpness were also evaluated. Results: CT identified 164 lesions, of which the experienced consensus panel visualized 113/164 lesions (68.9%) on both UTEu and UTEe, three on UTEu only, three on UTEe only, and 45 on neither; the inexperienced panel visualized 93/164 lesions (56.7%) on UTEu and 91/164 (55.5%) on UTEe; 91 lesions were visible on both acquisitions, two on UTEu only, none on UTEe only, and 71 on neither. In field-strength-stratified end-to-end analyses, successful-characterization rates ranged from 55 to 71% for UTEe, and 51 to 71% for UTEu derived from experienced reader panel. Among common-visible lesions, no statistically detectable UTEu-UTEe differences were demonstrated for most evaluated morphological features. Conclusions: Across all CT-detected lesions, the ability of spiral-UTE to accurately characterize pulmonary nodule morphology was constrained by incomplete lesion visualization. Our analyses did not demonstrate a statistically detectable UTEu-UTEe difference for most evaluated morphological features. Among UTE-visible lesions, both acquisitions showed relatively high accuracy for several morphological features.
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BibTeX
@article{fu2026comparison,
title = {{Comparison of Pulmonary Nodule Morphology on Pre-Contrast and Delayed Post-Contrast Stack-of-Spirals Ultrashort Echo Time MRI.}},
author = {Qing Fu and Peng-Wei Shu and Ren-Qiang Yu and Jia-Wei Wu and Zi-Kai Li and Ting Yin and Thomas Benkert and Jing Peng and Hao-Hao Lu and Fa-Jin Lv},
journal = {Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland)},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.3390/diagnostics16193170},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42882325},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Comparison of Pulmonary Nodule Morphology on Pre-Contrast and Delayed Post-Contrast Stack-of-Spirals Ultrashort Echo Time MRI.
AU - Qing Fu
AU - Peng-Wei Shu
AU - Ren-Qiang Yu
AU - Jia-Wei Wu
AU - Zi-Kai Li
AU - Ting Yin
AU - Thomas Benkert
AU - Jing Peng
AU - Hao-Hao Lu
AU - Fa-Jin Lv
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/29
JO - Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland)
DO - 10.3390/diagnostics16193170
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42882325
AB - Background: Stack-of-spirals ultrashort TE (spiral-UTE) MRI has shown promise for radiation-free pulmonary nodule detection, and previous studies have reported closely matched observed pulmonary nodule detection rates between contrast-enhanced (UTEe) and unenhanced (UTEu) acquisitions. However, whether this performance extends to detailed lesion-level morphological characterization and whether delayed post-contrast spiral-UTE provides additional morphological information compared with the pre-contrast acquisition under the clinical imaging protocol remain incompletely understood. Therefore, this study compared UTEu and UTEe for lesion-level morphological assessment using CT as the reference standard. Methods: A total of 61 patients with pulmonary nodules/masses (>5 mm) identified on chest CT were enrolled. Patients underwent spiral-UTE MRI on either a 1.5 T scanner (27 patients, 63 lesions) or a 3.0-T scanner (34 patients, 101 lesions). Two fixed consensus reader panels with different experience profiles evaluated lesion visualization and detailed morphological features separately on sequential pre-contrast UTEu and delayed post-contrast UTEe. Two complementary morphology analyses were performed. First, end-to-end successful characterization was assessed across all CT-detected eligible lesions; for each feature, successful characterization required both lesion visualization on the corresponding UTE acquisition and correct feature classification relative to CT. Nonvisualized lesions were designated not characterizable and therefore unsuccessful for this composite outcome. Second, conditional sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy were evaluated among lesions visualized on both UTEu and UTEe to compare morphology interpretation after successful lesion visualization. Lesion size agreement, contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), and edge sharpness were also evaluated. Results: CT identified 164 lesions, of which the experienced consensus panel visualized 113/164 lesions (68.9%) on both UTEu and UTEe, three on UTEu only, three on UTEe only, and 45 on neither; the inexperienced panel visualized 93/164 lesions (56.7%) on UTEu and 91/164 (55.5%) on UTEe; 91 lesions were visible on both acquisitions, two on UTEu only, none on UTEe only, and 71 on neither. In field-strength-stratified end-to-end analyses, successful-characterization rates ranged from 55 to 71% for UTEe, and 51 to 71% for UTEu derived from experienced reader panel. Among common-visible lesions, no statistically detectable UTEu-UTEe differences were demonstrated for most evaluated morphological features. Conclusions: Across all CT-detected lesions, the ability of spiral-UTE to accurately characterize pulmonary nodule morphology was constrained by incomplete lesion visualization. Our analyses did not demonstrate a statistically detectable UTEu-UTEe difference for most evaluated morphological features. Among UTE-visible lesions, both acquisitions showed relatively high accuracy for several morphological features.
SN - 2075-4418
ER -