IMPULSE: A Generalized and Scalable Algorithm for Joint Design of Minimum SAR Parallel Transmit RF Pulses

Joint design of pTx RF waveforms and excitation k-space trajectories to mitigate flip angle inhomogeneity while abiding by strict patient-specific SAR limits is a difficult nonconvex problem. We describe the minSAR formulation of the problem and an efficient new optimization algorithm (IMPULSE). Major benefits of the algorithm include (a) direct optimization using a complete SAR estimate without compression, (b) tractable optimization of k-space trajectories, and (c) ability to perform joint optimization across many pulses to allow temporal hotspot averaging. Compared to prior methods, we demonstrate reduced local SAR values and shorter computation times for identical levels of excitation homogeneity.

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