Zhaolin Chen1,2, Leigh Johnston1,2, Zang-Hee Cho3, Gary Egan1,4
1Howard Florey Institute, Carlton South, VIC, Australia; 2Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia; 3Neuroscience Research Institute, Incheon, Korea; 4Centre for Neuroscience, University of Melbourne, Australia
MR phase images provide additional information beyond magnitude images. It has been noted that the SENSE reconstruction using traditional square-root-sum-of-squares sensitivity estimation approach cannot provide accurate phase reconstruction for single echo although it can preserve dynamic phase updates among echoes. This paper presents a phase optimized sensitivity estimation method for the self-calibrated SENSE methods. The new method can provide improved phase contrasts in structural imaging applications. Demonstrated in both the 3T and the 7T datasets, the proposed method produces dramatically improved phase image contrasts when compared with the current sensitivity estimation method. The new method is potentially useful for both structural and dynamic phase sensitive imaging applications.