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Contrast-to-noise ratio of multiple slice spin lock technique: prospects for liver imaging

¹ Jorvi Hospital, Department of Radiology, Turuntie 150, 02740 Espoo, ² Helsinki University of Technology, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Otakaari 5 A, 02150 Espoo, ³ Helsinki University Central Hospital, Department of Radiology, Haartmaninkatu 4, 00290 Helsinki and ⁴ Philips Medical Imaging, Helsinki, Finland

View larger version (149K): [in a new window]   Figure 1. A section of liver obtained with the SL technique with different locking pulse durations (TL). (a) TL=0 ms, (b) TL=10 ms, (c) TL=20 ms and (d) TL=40 ms. Note the strongly decreasing signal from normal liver parenchyma as the TL increases.

View larger version (10K): [in a new window]   Figure 2. Graph demonstrating the contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) dependence on the number of slices (N) with varying locking field lengths (TL). The fewer the number of slices, the higher the acquired CNR. However, with short locking pulse durations, the differencies in CNR are small.

View larger version (15K): [in a new window]   Figure 3. Contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) curves are produced for the multiple slice SL technique with different locking field durations (TL from 0 to 40 ms) as a function of the flip angle (). The highest acquired CNR is obtained with approximately 60° and with TL of 20 ms.