Rapid Quantitative Abdominal Imaging With Magnetic Resonance Fingerprinting (MRF)

摘要

Example embodiments associated with characterizing a sample using NMR fingerprinting are described. One example NMR apparatus includes an NMR logic that repetitively and variably samples a (k, t, E) space associated with an object to acquire a set of NMR signals that are associated with different points in the (k, t, E) space. The NMR signals are produced in response to a FISP-MRF pulse sequence. Sampling is performed with t and/or E varying in a non-constant way. The NMR apparatus may also include a signal logic that produces an NMR signal evolution from the NMR signals and a characterization logic that characterizes a tissue in the object as a result of comparing acquired signals to reference signals. Acquired signals are corrected using data describing an inhomogeneous B1 field produced by the NMR apparatus while the set of NMR signals are acquired.

主权项

1. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer-executable instructions that when executed by a computer control the computer to perform a method, the method comprising:
accessing a set of known magnetic resonance fingerprinting (MRF) signal evolutions; accessing an acquired nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) signal produced by a volume that contains one or more resonant species that simultaneously produced individual NMR signals in response to MRF excitation produced by a fast imaging with steady-state free precession (FISP) MRF pulse sequence applied to the volume by an NMR apparatus; accessing a B1 field map that characterizes a B1 field produced by the NMR apparatus in the volume; determining quantitative values for two or more parameters of a resonant species in a voxel in the volume based, at least in part, on matching the acquired NMR signal to the set of known MRF signal evolutions, where the two or more parameters include T1, T2, and proton density, T1 being spin-lattice relaxation, T2 being spin-spin relaxation; producing corrected quantitative values from the quantitative values based, at least in part, on the B1 field map, and producing an image of at least a portion of the volume based, at least in part, on the corrected quantitative values.