Non-Invasive Measurement of In-Vivo Elasticity of Skeletal Muscles with MR-Elastography

In order to evaluate the mechanical properties of the human skeletal muscles, the elasticity and viscosity of the human calf muscles were measured with Magnetic Resonance Elastography (MRE). MRE is a novel method to measure the mechanical properties of living soft tissues in vivo quantitatively by observing the strain waves propagated in the object. In this study, the shear modulus and viscosity coefficient were measured with MRE. The shear modulus was 3.7 kPa in relaxed state, and increased with increasing the muscle forces. Interestingly, the viscosity was changed with the vibration frequency applied to the muscles, that was 4.5 Pa·s at 100Hz vibration and 2.4 Pa·s at 200Hz vibration. This shows clearly the visco-elastic property.