Zebra stripes

Last revised by Andrew Murphy on 23 Mar 2023

Zebra stripes, a.k.a. zebra artifacts, appear as alternating bright and dark bands in a MRI image. The term has been used to describe several different kind of artifacts causing some confusion.

Artifacts that have been described as a zebra artifact include the following:

Zebra stripes have been described associated with susceptibility artifacts.

In CT there is also a zebra artifact from 3D reconstructions and a zebra sign from hemorrhage in the cerebellar sulci, and potentially-confusingly a zebra stripe sign in the bones of those treated with cyclical bisphosphonates for osteogenesis imperfecta 3,4.

It therefore seems prudent to use "zebra" with a term like "stripes" rather than "artifacts".

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