New RF pulse for the improvement of MRI images

In general, the sinc function is the standard radiofrequency (RF) pulse employed in MRI studies. In the present study, we experimentally produced 'the original function' by extending the Fourier cosine transform to the sinc-Gaussian function. Theoretic slice profiles obtained using the original function showed a greater improvement in the rectangular shape compared with the sinc function. As to the physical evaluation performed with 1T-MRI clinical equipment, the suppressed decrease in Contrast to Noise Ratio was higher with the original function than the sinc function in the volunteer head image multi-slice evaluation. Thus, all the results from the simulation and the clinical equipment evaluation demonstrate that the original function can improve the quality of MRI images even with shorter Echo Time. (author)