Shawn Wagner1,2, Pratip Bhattacharya1, Brain D. Ross1,2
1Enhanced MR Laboratory, Huntington Medical Research Institutes, Pasadena, CA, USA; 2Rudi Schulte Research Institute, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
We investigated how to maximize the signal obtained with a variable angle pulse scheme used for imaging hyperpolarized compounds. By using different hypothetical T1 values we compare the total signal acquisition over a 60 second time window for 12 five second acquisitions. The calculations demonstrate that there is a signal advantage to repeating the same variable angle sequence over each image acquisition when compared to a continuous variable pulse angle ending in a 90 degree pulse.