Method of performing diffusion weighted magnetic resonance measurements

Abstract

According to a first aspect of the present inventive concept, there is provided a method for performing a diffusion weighted magnetic resonance measurement on a sample, the method comprising: operating a magnetic resonance scanner to apply a diffusion encoding sequence to the sample; and operating the magnetic resonance scanner to acquire from the sample one or more echo signals; wherein the diffusion encoding sequence comprises a diffusion encoding time-dependent magnetic field gradient g(t) with non-zero components gl(t) along at least two orthogonal directions y and z, and a b-tensor having at least two non-zero eigenvalues, the magnetic field gradient comprising a first and subsequent second encoding block, wherein an n-th order gradient moment magnitude along direction l∈(y, z) is given by |Mnl(t)|=|∫0tgl(t′)t′ndt′|, and the first encoding block is adapted to yield, at an end of the first encoding block: along said direction y, |Mny(t)|≤Tn for each 0≤n≤m, where Tn is a predetermined n-th order threshold, and along said direction z, |Mnz(t)|≤Tn for each 0≤n≤m−1 and |Mnz(t)|>Tn for n=m; and the second encoding block is adapted to yield, at an end of the second encoding block: along each one of said directions l∈(y, z): |Mnl(t)|≤Tn for each 0≤n≤m, wherein m is an integer order equal to or greater than 1.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.