bSSFP phase correction and its use in magnetic resonance electrical properties tomography

Purpose Balanced steady‐state free precession (bSSFP) sequence is widely used because of its high SNR and high speed. However, bSSFP images suffer from “banding artifact” caused by B 0 inhomogeneity. In this article, we propose a method to remove this artifact in bSSFP phase images and investigate the usage of the corrected phase images in phase‐based magnetic resonance electrical properties tomography (MREPT). Theory and Methods Two bSSFP phase images, obtained with different excitation frequencies, are collaged to get rid of the regions containing banding artifacts. Phase of the collaged bSSFP image is the sum of the transceive phase of the RF system and an error term that depends on B 0 and T 2 . By using B 0 and T 2 maps, this error is eliminated from bSSFP phase images by using pixel‐wise corrections. Conductivity maps are obtained from the uncorrected and the corrected phase images using the phase‐based cr‐MREPT method. Results Phantom and human experiment results of the proposed method are illustrated for both phase images and conductivity maps. It is shown that uncorrected phase images yield unacceptable conductivity images. When only B 0 information is used for phase correction conductivity, reconstructions are substantially improved, and yet T 2 information is still needed to fully recover accurate and undistorted conductivity images. Conclusions With the proposed technique, B 0 sensitivity of the bSSFP phase images can be removed by using B 0 and T 2 maps. It is also shown that corrected bSSFP phase images are of sufficient quality to be used in conductivity imaging.