Active shimming of the lung for mitigation of bSSFP banding artifacts at high fields

Motivation: Balanced steady state free precession (bSSFP) has shown excellent promise for structural and functional lung MRI but is limited at high fields due to prominent off-resonances. Goal(s): To evaluate the potential of active shimming of the lung to mitigate off-resonance related artifacts for imaging the lung with bSSFP. Approach: Using sub-millisecond TE, volumetric field maps of the lung were generated at 3T in healthy volunteers. Active shimming of lung tissue is performed off-line. Results: Predefined active shimming of the lung resulted in an increased field homogeneity and improved results for functional lung MRI with bSSFP at 3T. Impact: This work shows the potential of dedicated active shimming methods of the lung to mitigate off-resonance related image artifacts for bSSFP-based structural and functional MRI of the lung at high fields.