Magnetic resonance apparatus and method for simultaneous multi-contrast acquisition with simultaneous multislice imaging

Abstract

A magnetic resonance (MR) method and apparatus use simultaneous multislice imaging, with different excitations being effective for different slices in respective iterations of a single scanning sequence, in order to acquire raw MR data from different multiple slices, with respectively different contrasts, in the single scanning sequence. Single band excitation of a first slice among the multiple slices takes place in a first iteration of the single scanning sequence, with multi-band excitation then occurring for all of the multiple slices. Raw data are then acquired from the first slice, and at least one other slice among the multiple slices, that respectively exhibit different contrasts due to only the first slice being affected by the single band excitation. In a second iteration of the single scanning sequence, another slice is excited with single band excitation, and the first slice is among the multiple slices excited with multi-band excitation. Raw data are then acquired from the first slice and at least one other slice among the multiple slices that have the respective contrasts swapped in comparison to the first iteration.