The invention presents an apparatus (6) for characterization of a condition of a vessel (12) wall of a living being (2). The relationship between temporal blood pressure (621) and blood flow (622) measurements of pulsatile blood motion within the vessel (12) is an indication of the health of the vessel (12) wall. Furthermore, the invention discloses a system (1) comprising the apparatus (6), and a method (100) of characterizing the condition of vessel (12) walls.

The present invention provides a method for magnetic resonance (MR) imaging of a subject of interest (120) using arterial spin labeling, comprising the steps of performing a labeling module (200) by applying magnetic and/or radio frequency (RF) fields to the subject of interest (120) for labeling arterial blood in at least a labeling region (144) thereof, performing a first readout module (202) to obtain first MR information of the subject of interest (120) in a region of interest (142) using first parameters, performing a second readout module (204) to obtain second MR information of the subject of interest (120) in a region of interest (142) using second parameters, and performing MR image generation of a region of interest (142) based on the first and second MR information, wherein the first and second parameters of the first and second readout module (202, 204) are chosen to be different parameters. The invention also provides a MR imaging system (110) adapted to perform the above method and a software package for upgrading a MR imaging system (110), whereby the software package contains instructions for controlling the MR imaging system (110) according to the above method.

Systems and methods are provided to incorporate an off-resonance correction into the pulse labeling train of PCASL/VEPCASL. In one or more aspects, the systems and methods are based on a method for generating an encoding scheme for any number and arrangement of blood vessels. The off-resonance correction can be incorporated into the generation of optimized encodings to acquire arterial spin labeling (ASL) data, such as PCASL and VEPCASL data.

A volume rendering image is obtained based on a 3D MRI image by automatically performing appropriate opacity setting. A three-dimensional image of a subject is received, a distribution of pixel values of the three-dimensional image is calculated, a pixel value of a predetermined feature amount is calculated based on the distribution of the pixel values, and opacity is set for each of the pixel value included in the three-dimensional image based on the pixel value of the feature amount. Accordingly, the opacity can be set automatically. The volume rendering image of the three-dimensional image is generated using the opacity.

A volume rendering image is obtained based on a 3D MRI image by automatically performing appropriate opacity setting. A three-dimensional image of a subject is received, a distribution of pixel values of the three-dimensional image is calculated, a pixel value of a predetermined feature amount is calculated based on the distribution of the pixel values, and opacity is set for each of the pixel value included in the three-dimensional image based on the pixel value of the feature amount. Accordingly, the opacity can be set automatically. The volume rendering image of the three-dimensional image is generated using the opacity.

The invention provides a fluid analysis apparatus, a method for operating a fluid analysis apparatus, and a fluid analysis program that display a flow velocity vector such that the tendency of a fluid flow is easily checked. A representative two-dimensional flow velocity vector representing a plurality of two-dimensional flow velocity vectors obtained by projecting three-dimensional flow velocity vectors of a plurality of voxels that overlap each other in a projection direction of a projection plane to the projection plane is acquired from three-dimensional volume data that has information of the three-dimensional flow velocity vector indicating the flow velocity of a fluid in an anatomical structure for each voxel and is displayed.

The present disclosure is directed to radially-based magnetic resonance imaging. In any one or more embodiments, the present methods and systems provide that the angular increment between subsequent radial k-space spokes to be sampled to provide the imaging is performed for a predetermined or pre-defined restricted set of reconstruction window sizes (numbers of radial spokes per frame), or limited views, to maximize the uniformity of sampling within the restricted set of window sizes.

The present invention relates to a magnetic resonance structure with a cavity or a reserved space that provides contrast and the additional ability to frequency-shift the spectral signature of the NMR-susceptible nuclei such as water protons by a discrete and controllable characteristic frequency shift that is unique to each MRS design. The invention also relates to nearly uniform solid magnetic resonance T.sub.2* contrast agents that have a significantly higher magnetic moment compared to similarly-sized existing MRI contrast agents.

A magnetic resonance imaging apparatus according to an embodiment includes sequence controlling circuitry and processing circuitry. The sequence controlling circuit executes, while a k-space is divided into a plurality of segments, a pulse sequence by which a tag pulse is applied and subsequently acquisition is performed. The processing circuit generates an image based on the pulse sequence executed by the sequence controlling circuit. The pulse sequence is a pulse sequence by which the acquisition is repeatedly performed at the center of the k-space. The sequence controlling circuit executes the pulse sequence, while changing the range to which the tag pulse is applied, for each of the plurality of segments.

Methods and systems generate synthetic late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) magnetic resonance images using a magnetic resonance fingerprinting (MRF) acquisition. From a single acquisition, MRF image data is obtained, including co-registered T.sub.1 and T.sub.2 tissue property maps. Different tissue regions of interest are identified, such as viable myocardium, scar, and blood and T.sub.1 and T.sub.2 values for each are determined. Based on these, different sets of pulse sequence parameters are determined, e.g., using different synthetic image contrast models receiving the MRF image data. Synthetic LGE images at different contrasts are generated as a result, including a synthetic bright-blood LGE image, a synthetic dark-blood/gray-blood LGE image, and a synthetic optimized imaged.