1Dept.
of Medicine, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI, United States; 2Dept.
of Biomedical Engineering, Vanderbilt Universiy, Nashville, TN, United States
There is recent interest in Simultaneous Multi-Slice (SMS) imaging because of reduced imaging times. SMS excitation is typically achieved with a single-slice pulse modulated to excite N identical slices. However, there has been little work done on extending SMS excitations to multi-dimensional RF pulses. For example, the Fast-kz or spokes 3D RF pulse has been shown to excite thin slices with in-plane B1+ inhomogeneity reduction. We present a simple, analytical proof-of-concept SMS Fast-kz pulse for correcting the central brightening associated with B1+ inhomogeneity from a volume transmitter. We demonstrate the excitation of multiple B1+ inhomogeneity compensated brain slices at 3T.
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