MR Line Scan Angiography using Spectral Analysis

In conventional line scan angiography, flow signal has been enhanced by the time_of_flight effect while the signal from stationary tissues has been suppressed by the saturation rf pulse followed by spoiling gradients. Due to the inhomogeneous rf field and the tissue dependent T1 relaxation time, however, stationary tissues can not be suppressed completely or uniformly, and the remnant stationary signal deteriorates the resultant angiogram. Here, the complete cancellation of stationary tissues is made possible by the spectral analysis of a series of repetitive line images of the same slice. The Fourier transformation of a set of line images results in the spectrum images, where stationary tissues are collected into the dc component while arteries are included in harmonic components because of the variation of the flow velocity and the resultant flow signal in arteries according to the cardiac cycle. The summation of harmonic components excluding the dc component results in the angiogram of arteries with the complete cancellation of stationary tissues.