Determination of a joint probability distribution of radius and length of anisotropic pores from double pulsed field gradient MRI data

A system comprising:

• a magnetic resonance (MR) system operable to apply three-dimensional (3-D) diffusion-based MR to an ensemble of pores and acquire resulting MR signal data from the applied 3-D diffusion-based MR;
• an MR data processing system configured to determine a marginal radius distribution (MRD) and a marginal length distribution (MLD) for the ensemble of pores based on the data obtained from 3-D diffusion-based MR, and configured to determine a joint radius-length distribution for the ensemble of pores based on data obtained from the applied 3-D diffusion-based MR and based on the MRD and the MLD;
• wherein the MR system is operable to acquire MR signal data from different orthogonal dimensions of the pores by selectively applying diffusion gradient vectors along different orthogonal dimensions of the pores;
• wherein the diffusion gradient vectors comprise:
• a first diffusion gradient applied in a first plane substantially perpendicular to a porous length dimension of the pores;
• a second diffusion gradient applied in a first direction along an axis substantially parallel to the porous length dimension of the pores;
• and
• a third diffusion gradient applied in a second plane perpendicular to the first plane and parallel to the first direction.