Other

Cornell Research Foundation Inc.

Thanh D Nguyen

Yi Jing Wang

Pascal Spincemaille

Methods of acquiring magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data for angiography. The present invention includes novel magnetization preparation schemes where the navigator and fat saturation pulses are executed in steady state after the preparatory pulses in order to minimize the delay between the magnetization preparation and the image echoes. The present invention also provides for improved methods of contrast-enhanced MRI where data are collected along non-linear trajectories through k-space and may also involve novel view ordering. In addition, the present methods employ novel motion corrections that minimize motion artifacts. The present invention further provides novel methods of self-calibrated sensitivity-encoded parallel imaging that allow for accurate and rapid scanning of subjects.

Magnetic resonance imaging concepts

A method and apparatus for detecting displacement of an object using navigator echoes is presented. For motion that is linear in 3D, a linear regression on k-space data is performed by fitting a straight line to the motion-induced phase shift using a k-space weighted least squares minimization to find the displacement. For general motion due to rotation, dilation, and displacement, a rotation angle and dilation scaling factors are determined from the magnitude k-space data by a weighted least squares minimization. A displacement vector is then obtained from the phase data in k-space using a weighted least squares minimization. The weighting factor takes into account that the noise in k-space is inversely proportional to the signal to noise ration. For motion of coronary arteries, the k-space data is acquired in one embodiment using selective volumetric excitation and sampling the resulting excited signal with a trajectory sensitized to the motion of interest.

Growing community of inventors

New York, NY, United States of America

Thanh D Nguyen