This invention relates generally to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and more particularly the invention relates to imaging short T2 species while suppressing longer T2 species.
The imaging of short T2 species, such as brain and tendon tissue for example, is difficult in the presence of longer T2 species such as water and fat.
The present invention is directed to providing RF pulses and the use of the pulses which can suppress longer T2 species and allow the imaging or shorter T2 species.
In accordance with the invention, RF pulses are provided which selectively invert or saturate nuclei spins based on length of the T2 parameter of the spins.
In one embodiment, longer T2 spins can be saturated while shorter T2 spins have less or no saturation. The saturated spins can be dephased, and then the shorter T2 spins can be excited and imaged with minimal interference from the longer T2 spins.
In another embodiment, a non-inverted image can be summed with an inverted image. Long T2 spins will have opposite signs in the two images and will cancel out. Alternatively, two selectively inverted images can be subtracted to eliminate the inverted larger T2 spins. If different inversion pulses are used, different T2 contrast can be realized and an image can be created that has a range of short T2 components with a maximum signal.
In another embodiment, a 2π pulse can be used for the non-inverted images. Combining an inverted image with a 2π prepared image will cancel long T2 signals and eliminate any residual signal that might remain if a non-inverted signal were used.
In another embodiment, a RF pulse can have multiple suppression bands whereby two species such as water and fat can be eliminated. For water and fat suppression, one suppression band is at the water resonance and one suppression band is at the lipid (fat) resonance.
In all embodiments, the amplitude of the RF pulse is kept sufficiently low to avoid exciting shorter T2 species and is sufficiently long to fully invert or saturate longer T2 species.
The invention and objects and features thereof will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description and appended claims when taken with the drawings.
a), 2(b) are images of short T2 species obtained with the pulse sequence of
a)-6(e) are images of a phantom using ultra-short echo time (UTE) imaging. The T2 values, in ms, of the phantoms are (top row, left to right) 4, 100, 50, (bottom row) 0.35, 20.
a) illustrates T2 profiles for the four pulses of
a), 9(b) are images with no T2 suppression and with T2 suppression.
a), 12(b) are axial ankle images with no suppression and with fat and water suppression for imaging tendons.
a), 13(b) are sagittal ankle images with no suppression and with fat and water long-T2 suppression for imaging tendons.
a), 14(b) are sagittal knee images with no suppression and with fat and water long-T2 suppression for imaging tendons.
The invention provides RF pulses that selectively invert or saturate longer T2 species without fully saturating shorter T2 species. The inversion pulses must have low amplitude and bandwidth so as not to invert shorter T2 species but with sufficient amplitude and duration to invert longer T2 species.
In one embodiment, adiabatic RF pulses are used to selectively invert longer T2 species without fully inverting shorter T2 species. Using adiabatic pulses offers the advantage of being extremely robust to any variations in RF amplitude. These variations are especially prevalent in surface coil excitation and can also be 20-30% in common head coils. All previous RF-based suppression methods are not robust to these variations and will suffer under adverse conditions.
To use these pulses for long-T2 suppression we propose a few methods. One method is to create a single image prepared with the inversion pulse and separate based on voxel phase. Longer T2s will be inverted and have opposite phase to short T2s. Since a minimum echo time is used there is little time for phase accrual that would interfere with the separation. Partial volume effects can be a problem with this method.
Another method is to sum a non-inverted image with an inverted image. Long-T2s will have opposite signs in each and will cancel out. Short-T2s will have the same sign and will become bright. One variation on this method is to sum an water-inverted image and a fat-inverted image. This has the advantage of canceling out fat in addition to long-T2s. Another variation is to subtract two inverted images. If different inversion pulses are used, they have different types of T2 contrast and create an image that has a range of short-T2s with maximum signal.
In a phase contrast method, an inversion preparation pulse is applied to invert longer T2 spins but not shorter T2 spins, and an image signal is obtained. The acquired image is separated into two images based on opposing phases of the short T2 spin signal and the inverted longer T2 spin signals.
In a fat long-T2 and water long-T2 suppression method, a first image is obtained after inverting longer T2 spins at the water resonance. Then, a second image is obtained after inverting longer T2 spins at the lipid (fat) resonance. The two images are combined which suppresses the longer T2 signals from water and fat while the short T2 signals add.
One variant of some of these methods would be to use an adiabatic 2π pulse for the non-inverted images. Since there is some T2 decay during the inversion pulse, even long-T2s are not fully inverted. During a 2π pulse the same decay will occur. Thus combining an inverted image and a 2π prepared image will exactly cancel out the long-T2s where some residual signal may have remained if a non-inverted image was used. Medium-T2s, which also have residual signal if a non-inverted image is used, will cancel out in this variation. The downside is that this method is slightly less SNR efficient because most short-T2 signal is destroyed in the 2π prepared image.
We can compare the method of summing a non-inverted and inverted image to rectangular long-T2 suppression pulses. We can design both such that they have the same T2 suppression. For this example, both have a factor of 10 suppression for T2 species longer than 50 ms, and a signal loss of 50% for T2=2 ms. The rectangular RF pulse method has a B0 bandwidth of ±32 Hz and a tolerance for ±6% B1 variations. Our method has a B0 bandwidth of ±36 Hz and a tolerance for ±20% B1 variations. For similar T2 profiles and B0 bandwidths, there is a factor of almost 4 improvement in B1 robustness over the previous method.
The only disadvantage is that the inversion pulses used are longer than the rectangular pulses, restricting the minimum TR. In the example above, a 20 ms adiabatic pulse and a 5 ms rectangular pulse were used. This is not a problem with long TRs common in UTE imaging (≈500 ms). Some of the proposed methods also require two images but both have signal from short-T2s. Other image combination techniques use later echo time images which have no signal from short-T2s, making our methods more SNR efficient.
When amplitude-modulated pulses have a long duration and low amplitude, short-T2 species are unaffected by the pulse. Similarly, adiabatic pulses of sufficiently low amplitude and narrow bandwidth will not excite short-T2 species. To minimize short-T2 attenuation, a near minimum amplitude should be used. This requires a long duration to maintain adiabaticity for long-T2 species.
Experiments were performed on a GE Excite 1.5T system. Inverted images were acquired by using an inversion pulse followed immediately by a dephaser and then a half-pulse excitation.
There are multiple possible techniques to remove long-T2s using adiabatic inverted images. The images can be separated based on their phase to produce short and long T2 images, as shown in
This pulse sequence was implemented and used to scan a number of short T2 species.
In accordance with an embodiment of the invention, a RF pulse can have multiple suppression bands. To create a long-T2 water and fat suppression pulse, we used multiple suppression bands—one for long-T2s at the water resonance and one for long-T2s at the lipid (fat) resonance. Adding a long-T2 fat suppression band increases the overall short-T2 attenuation slightly.
The set of novel pulses we have designed has spectrally selective suppression bands at the lipid and water resonances with minimal effects on the short-T2 magnetization. They are maximum phase to assist with dephasing the saturated magnetization. This pulse will suppress long-T2 components in water and fat, leaving only short-T2s with longitudinal magnetization.
Design of these pulses was done using the Shinnar-LeRoux (SLR) pulse design algorithm. The pulses have suppression bands on the water and lipid resonances. The bandwidth of these bands can be adjusted depending on the expected B0 variation and quality of shim of a given application, keeping in mind that a minimal bandwidth should be used to minimize short-T2 attenuation. They are also designed with maximum phase to assist with the dephasing of the saturated magnetization.
These pulses are designed for use with UTE imaging. They are applied immediately before the excitation and imaging sequences. A crusher gradient is used following the pulse to dephase the long-T2 components that are in the transverse plane. This leaves only short-T2 components with longitudinal magnetization, and thus they are the only components imaged.
In theory, we solved the Bloch equation for MZ at conclusion of a RF pulse, ω1(t). We included T2 decay but not T1 decay and assumed T2 is much shorter than the pulse duration to obtain the following result:
This result shows that short-T2 attenuation is proportional to the integrated squared spectrum of an RF pulse.
The SLR pulse design algorithm is useful for designing long-T2 suppression pulses because it allows us to put most of the pulse energy in the suppression band. Equation (1) tells us that this limits short-T2 attenuation while maximizing bandwidth. The algorithm also creates the minimum power RF pulse for a given profile. The pulses are maximum phase to assist the suppression and shrink the transition widths. We also used the complex Parks-McClellan algorithm to design dual band pulses with fat and water long-T2 suppression. The RF pulses used are shown in
We can demonstrate how our long-T2 water suppression pulses are an improvement over previous rectangular pulses. For comparison, both pulses will have a factor of 20 suppression for T2 species longer than 30 ms, and a signal loss of 50% for T2=2 ms. The rectangular pulse has a factor of 20 suppression bandwidth of ±20 Hz, while our pulses have a bandwidth of ±44 Hz. This is over a factor of 2 improvement in B0 bandwidth.
We can also compare our long-T2 water and fat suppression pulses to rectangular long-T2 suppression pulses. We can design both such that they have the same T2 suppression. For this example, both have a factor of 20 suppression for T2 species longer than 30 ms, and a signal loss of 50% for T2=1.6 ms. The rectangular RF pulse has a factor of 20 suppression B0 bandwidth of ±23 Hz. Our pulse has a factor of 20 suppression B0 bandwidth of +44 Hz at the water resonance and an additional ±31 Hz of bandwidth at the fat resonance.
When the fat-inverted and water-inverted images are combined (d), only the signal from the cortical bone and other short-T2s remain bright. Without suppression (a), the cortical bone has signal, but is difficult to distinguish from surrounding muscle and fat in the bone marrow. When the amplitude of the adiabatic pulse is increased by 15%, the suppression does not suffer at all (e).
The only disadvantage is that our pulses are longer than the rectangular pulse, restricting the minimum TR. This is generally not a problem with long TRs common in UTE imaging (≈500 ms).
The novel pulses we have designed suppresses long-T2 species at both the fat and water resonance. This differs from previous long-T2 suppression pulses which just suppressed long-T2s at the water resonance. As noted above, long-T2 water and fat suppression are both essential for many UTE imaging applications. Using one pulse to accomplish both is a simple and new technique that will create better UTE images.
The new long-T2 water suppression pulses we have designed are also an improvement over previous long-T2 suppression pulses. Previously, only rectangular RF pulses and variations had been used. Our pulses are shaped and designed using the SLR algorithm, a technique that had never been previously applied to long-T2 suppression pulses.
The pulses shown are designed for 1.5 T systems and reasonable expected B0 variations. These pulses could also be designed for other magnet strength systems and also with different bandwidths, as the application requires. The lipid and water bandwidths can be adjusted.
There may be other applications beyond UTE imaging where it is desired to suppress water and lipid resonances. Our pulses can provide very selective suppression, inversion, or excitation of just these two important tissue resonances. They are designed to use a minimal amount of RF power to minimize short-T2 attenuation.
The invention has been described with reference to specific embodiments. However, the description is illustrative of the invention and is not to be construed as limiting the invention. Various modifications and applications may occur to those skilled in the art without departing from the true spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
This application claims benefit under 35 USC 119 to U.S: Provisional Patent Application No. 60/665,981, filed Mar. 28, 2005, entitled “USING ADIABATIC PULSES FOR LONG-T2 SUPPRESSION” which is incorporated herein for all purposes.
The U.S. government has rights in the disclosed invention pursuant to NIH grant to Stanford University, Grant No.: R01 EB002524.
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