Quantitative solid‐state NMR imaging of synthetic calcium phosphate implants

It is shown that solid‐state phosphorus‐31 nuclear magnetic resonance imaging can be used to measure quantitatively the mass of hydroxyapatite (HA), a synthetic calcium phosphate used as an orthopedic implant material, in the presence of bone. A three‐dimensional projection reconstruction tech‐nique was used to produce solid‐state images from 998 free induction decays sampled in the presence of a fixed amplitude field gradient whose direction was varied uniformly over the unit sphere. Chemical selection is achieved using T1 contrast, as the synthetic calcium phosphate has a shorter T1 (1.8 sec at 4.7 T) compared with the bone (approximately 15 sec at 4.7 T in vivo, 42 sec ex vivo). Experimental results demonstrating the linear relationship between image intensity and HA density in phantoms containing HA and silicon (IV) oxide, and HA and bone are shown. Chemically pure images of bone mineral and synthetic HA have been computed from images of New Zealand White rabbits acquired in vivo at two different recycle times. The technique can be used to follow non‐invasively the resorption and remodeling of calcium phosphate implants in vivo. Magn Reson Med 41:1214–1220, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.