Anisotropic field-of-view shapes for improved PROPELLER imaging

The Periodically Rotated Overlapping ParallEL Lines with Enhanced Reconstruction (PROPELLER) method for magnetic resonance imaging data acquisition and reconstruction has the highly desirable property of being able to correct for motion during the scan, making it especially useful for imaging pediatric or uncooperative patients and diffusion imaging. This method nominally supports a circular field of view (FOV), but tailoring the FOV for noncircular shapes results in more efficient, shorter scans. This article presents new algorithms for tailoring PROPELLER acquisitions to the desired FOV shape and size that are flexible and precise. The FOV design also allows for rotational motion which provides better motion correction and reduced aliasing artifacts. Some possible FOV shapes demonstrated are ellipses, ovals and rectangles, and any convex, pi-symmetric shape can be designed. Standard PROPELLER reconstruction is used with minor modifications, and results with simulated motion presented confirm the effectiveness of the motion correction with these modified FOV shapes. These new acquisition design algorithms are simple and fast enough to be computed for each individual scan. Also presented are algorithms for further scan time reductions in PROPELLER echo-planar imaging (EPI) acquisitions by varying the sample spacing in two directions within each blade.