Heart failure (HF) is a major cause of human suffering and death. Rodent models of cardiac disease provide irreplaceable insight into the underlying mechanisms behind HF development, with the goal of improving diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of heart disease. Over the last few years, ultra high-field small-animal MRI has been established as an important tool in preclinical research, and we have seen the emergence of tools facilitating evaluation of regional myocardial function in small animals.
This talk will present some of the latest approaches in MRI for investigating cardiac function (and dysfunction) in small animals, and why the tiny hearts may have such a large impact.