William Dominguez-Viqueira1, Albert P. Chen2, Charles H. Cunningham1, 3
1Imaging Research, Sunnybrook Research Institute, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; 2GE Healthcare, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; 3Dept. of Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
A rapid spectral-spatial echo-planar imaging pulse sequence was developed previously for time-resolved 3D metabolic imaging with correction for the spatial shifts that occur in practice due to field inhomogeneities. In this work, an automated method was developed to create higher SNR images by correcting the spatial shifts and summing k-space data from multiple time points. Higher SNR maps of the hyperpolarized 13C metabolites with excellent contrast were obtained and shown. The tradeoffs between spatial-temporal resolution and image quality inherent in this technique are discussed.