The General Hospital Corporation

Mary Kate Manhard

Zijing Zhang

JaeJin Cho

Congyu Liao

Magnetic resonance imaging ('MRI') using a spin- and gradient-echo (“SAGE”) pulse sequence with blip up-down acquisition (“BUDA”) encoding enables distortion-free, high-resolution diffusion-weighted imaging and/or quantitative parameter mapping. Phase-encoding polarities are alternated across shots during a multi-shot acquisition. In each shot, multi-contrast data are acquired at echo times associated with a gradient echo, a mixed gradient-and-spin echo, and a spin echo. High in-plane resolution and distortion-free quantitative parameter maps can be generated, such as T2 maps. T2* maps, paramagnetic susceptibility maps, and diamagnetic susceptibility maps. Diffusion-weighted data can be acquired using diffusion encoding gradients and BUDA encoding, where multi-contrast data are acquired in the b=0 acquisition. Diffusion parameter maps can be generated from the b=0 and diffusion-weighted data.

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Cambridge, MA, United States of America

Mary Kate Manhard