The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jan. 12, 2010
Filed:
Mar. 07, 2008
Candice A. Bookwalter, University Heights, OH (US);
Jeffrey L. Sunshine, Pepper Pike, OH (US);
Jeffrey L. Duerk, Avon Lake, OH (US);
Candice A. Bookwalter, University Heights, OH (US);
Jeffrey L. Sunshine, Pepper Pike, OH (US);
Jeffrey L. Duerk, Avon Lake, OH (US);
Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (US);
Abstract
The present invention is directed to methods for chemical species signal suppression in magnetic resonance imaging procedures, wherein Dixon techniques are enhanced by continuously sampling techniques. In the invention, k-space data is acquired during the entire period of read gradient associated with a gradient echo pulse acquisition scheme. The invention utilizes a total sampling time (TST) acquisition during the entire read gradient, using three echoes of a TST data set to achieve chemical species separation in both homogenous fields as well as areas of field inhomogeneity. As an example, a continuously sampled rectilinearly FLASH pulse sequence is modified such that the time between echoes was configured to be 2.2 milliseconds, with TE selected to allow 180° phase variation in the fat magnetization between each of the three TE's (TE, TE, and TE). Data collected during the dephase and rephase gradient lobes are defined as a first Dixon acquisition, with data collected by the read gradient lobe being defined as a second Dixon acquisition. Two point Dixon reconstruction techniques are used to form images for each chemical species, such as for generating water and fat images of the scanned object region. Other corrections, such as off-resonance correction may be applied on the image data.