Background:There are few studies for evaluating plaque characteristics of nonstenotic basilar arteries (BA).Our aim was to determine entire BA plaques with a three-dimensional volumetric isotropic turbo spin-echo acquisition (VISTA) and investigate the differences between the patients with and without isolated pontine infarction (IPI).Methods:Twenty-four consecutive symptomatic patients with nonstenotic BA on time of flight magnetic resonance angiography (TOF MRA) were enrolled from China-Japan Friendship Hospital between January 2014 and December 2014.BA was classified as normal orirregular based on TOF MRA,and normal wall,slight wall-thickening,and plaque based on three-dimensional VISTA images.Outcomes from MRA and VISTA were compared.Patients were categorized as IPI and non-IPI groups based on the diffusion-weighted imaging.Clinical and plaque characteristics were compared between the two groups.Results:A total of 1024 image slices including 311 (30.37％) plaque slices,427 (41.70％) slight wall-thickening slices,and 286 (27.93％) normal wall slices for the entire BA from 23 patients were finally included for analysis.VISTA images detected plaques in all the 9 (100％) irregular MRA patients and 7 of 14 (50％) normal MRA patients.IPI was found in 1 1 (47.83％) patients.Compared to non-IPI group,the IPI group had a higher percentage of plaque slices (P =0.001) and lower percentage of normal wall slices (P =0.014) than non-IPI group.Conclusions:Three-dimensional VISTA images enable detection of BA plaques not visualized by MRA.BA plaques could be found in both the IPI and non-IPI group.However,IPI group showed plaques more extensively in BA than the non-IPI group.