Abstract #0288

MR Fingerprinting (MRF): A Novel Quantitative Approach to MRI

Dan Ma¹, Vikas Gulani¹,², Nicole Seiberlich¹, Jeffrey Duerk¹, Mark Griswold¹,²

¹Department of Biomedical Engineering, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, United States; ²Dept. of Radiology, University Hospitals of Cleveland and Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, United States

MR Fingerprinting is a completely novel approach to quantitative MRI. Instead of collecting a series of weighted images and fitting signal time courses to an exponential model, MRF eschews collection of traditional images and a model based approach altogether. A compressed sensing based approach is adopted where information about each voxel is collected with signal timecourses generated using variable TRs, flip angles, and inversion pulses to encode relaxation information into unique signal evolution curves. Matching these curves to a comprehensive dictionary using pattern matching provides multiple parameter mappings (T1, T2, proton density and off-resonance) and synthesized reconstructed images simultaneously.