Table 2 Study overview (consensus recommendation MRSinMRS).

1. Hardware

 (a) Filed strength [T]

3 T

 (b) Manufacturer

Philips

 (c) Model (software version)

5.4.1

 (d) RF coils:

¹H MRS, 32 channel head coil

 (e) Additional hardware:

N/A

2. Acquisition

 (a) Pulse sequence

PRESS

 (b) Volume of interest (VOI), locations

(1) pons, (2) cerebellar vermis, (3) cerebellar hemisphere

 (c) Nominal VOI size [mm³]

(1) 25 × 20 × 20 mm³, (2) 20 × 10 × 20 mm³, (3) 20 × 10 × 20 mm³

 (d) Repetition time (T_R), echo time (T_E)

T_R = 2000 ms, T_E = 30 ms

 (e) Number of signal acquisitions (NSA)

(1) NSA = 128, (2) NSA = 256, (3) NSA = 128

 (f) Additional sequence parameters

Metabolite cycled inversion pulse shift 180 Hz

 (g) Water suppression method

Non-water suppressed metabolite cycling

 (h) Shimming method

2nd order pencil-beam B₀ field shimming

 (i) Triggering or motion correction

N/A

3. Data analysis methods and outputs

(a) Analysis software

¹H MR spectroscopy data were processed from data/list format from the scanner using in-house developed MatLab scripts using Gannet (3.1) and MR libs software

(b) Processing steps deviating

Residual water suppression (HLSVD) and apodization filter (BW = 1 Hz) was applied to the non-water suppressed spectra before quantification by LCModel 6.3

(c) Output measure

Concentrations to internal water

4. Data quality

 (a) Reported values (SNR, linewidth)

SNR (as reported by LCModel)

 (1) cSCI: 23.1 ± 2.3 (19–26), sSCI: 23.0 ± 1.8 (21–26), HC: 25.9 ± 4.1 (20–34); overall: 24.2 ± 3.4 (19–34)

 (2) cSCI: 17.4 ± 1.6 (14–20), sSCI: 18.4 ± 0.8 (18–20), HC: 18.8 ± 2.5 (14–23); overall: 18.1 ± 2.0 (14–23)

 (3) cSCI: 12.9 ± 2.0 (10–18), sSCI: 13.4 ± 1.5 (12–16), HC: 14.8 ± 3.0 (10–20), overall: 13.7 ± 2.6 (10–20)

FWHM (Hz)

 (1) cSCI: 7.4 ± 1.3 (4.8–9.7), sSCI: 6.2 ± 1.5 (4.8–8.8), HC: 6.7 ± 1.5 (4.8–9.7), overall: 6.9 ± 1.5 (4.8–9.7)

 (2) cSCI: 5.6 ± 0.9 (3.9–6.7), sSCI: 5.0 ± 0.4 (4.8–5.8), HC: 4.7 ± 1.0 (3.96.9), overall: 5.2 ± 1.0 (3.9–6.7)

 (3) cSCI: 6.5 ± 1.5 (4.8–11.7), sSCI: 5.8 ± 1.1 (4.8–7.8), HC: 6.5 ± 1.3 (4.8–9.7), overall: 6.4 ± 1.4 (4.8–11.7)

No subjects excluded due to MRS data quality (two subjects excluded before the analysis due to high depression and anxiety score)

 (b) Data exclusion criteria

 (c) Quality of measures of postprocessing model fitting

CRLB of NAA

 (1) cSCI: 3.1 ± 0.5 (2–4), sSCI: 2.6 ± 0.5 (2–3), HC: 2.7 ± 0.6 (2–4), overall: 2.9 ± 0.6 (2–4)

 (2) cSCI: 3.6 ± 0.5 (3–4), sSCI: 3.4 ± 0.5 (3–4), HC: 3.3 ± 0.5 (3–4), overall: 3.4 ± 0.5 (3–4)

 (3) cSCI: 4.7 ± 1.0 (3–6), sSCI: 4.2 ± 0.4 (4–5), HC: 4.3 ± 0.6 (3–5), overall: 4.4 ± 0.8 (3–6)

 (d) sample spectrum

Figure 1