Eric K. Gibbons1,
Manoj Saranathan2, Brian K. Rutt2, John M. Pauly3,
Adam B. Kerr3
1Department
of Bioengineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States; 2Department
of Radiology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States; 3Department
of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States
Brain lesion detection at 7T is complicated by the T1 lengthening observed for white and grey matter without a corresponding increase in CSF T1. As a consequence, there is lower SNR and contrast for grey and white matter in FLAIR sequences designed to null CSF signal. The recently developed MP-FLAIR 3D FSE sequence introduced a magnetization preparation sequence to initially saturate white/grey matter Mz so as to allow for greater recovery during the FLAIR inversion period. In this preliminary work, we examine the possibility of eliminating the inversion preparation entirely, using instead a T2 and diffusion preparation sequence, with the goal being CSF signal suppression due to its higher diffusion, and simultaneous introduction of combined T2/diffusion contrast between white/grey matter and lesions.