The Dependence Of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Image Contrast On Intrinsic And Operator-Selectable Parameters

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Abstract
In nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) the image pixel value is governed by four intrinsic parameters: the spin density ρ, the spin-lattice relaxation time T1, the spin-spin relaxation time T2 and, for non-stationary spins, the flow velocity v. The extent to which the signal is weighted toward one or several parameters is related to the history of the spin system preceding the detection pulse. In the present work T1 and T2 were determined in vivo for several regions in the CNS from inversion-recovery (T1) And multiple-echo (T2) images, using least-squares fitting procedures. From averaged values of T1 and T2 in grey matter, white matter and CSF, the signal intensity was calculated on the basis of the Bloch equations and plotted as a function of the intrinsic parameters for the three most common imaging pulse sequences. These data are in excellent agreement with images, recorded from normal volunteers on an experimental whole-body imaging system operating at 12.8 MHz (0.3T). The graphical presentation of contrast further will provide the radiologist with a straightforward tool for image interpretation.
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