Magnetic Resonance Imaging in a Nutshell

Abstract

Since its invention in the early 70s by Lauterbur (Lauterbur 1973; Mansfield and Grannell 1973) and Mansfield (Mansfield 1977), for which they shared the 2003 Nobel prize in Physiology and Medicine, magnetic resonance imagingMagnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has evolved into a versatile tool for the in vivo examination of tissue. MRI is based on the nuclear magnetic resonanceNuclear magnetic resonance phenomenon. Although MRI is based on quantum mechanicalQuantum mechanics properties of the particles at the sub-atom level, the large ensemble of particles in the tissue allows for a semiclassical description that can be relatively easily accessed. We very shortly review the basic ideas of MRI. A number of special MR imaging sequences, i.e., sequences of gradient and RF excitations, have proven to be very important for the neuroscientific research, especially the functional and diffusion-weighted MRI and, recently, the multiparameter mapping. These data and their analysis will be the subject of the main chapters of this book. Here we provide a teaser on the basic acquisition principles.