title: About the origins of NMR diffusion-weighting induced by frequency-swept pulses.
abstract: In the present work, the non-linear phase dispersion induced by slice selective frequency-swept pulses is analyzed, in order to assess NMR signal attenuation due to molecular diffusion during such pulses. In particular, theoretical considerations show that diffusion-weighting can be calculated based on the non-linear phase spatial derivative (i.e. the phase gradient), and that the phase of B(1) field at the instant of the flip does not contribute to phase scrambling and diffusion-weighting, yielding a simple analytical expressions. The theory is validated by confrontation with numerical simulations of the Bloch equations including diffusion, performed for a pair of hyperbolic secant pulses and a pair of CHIRP pulses. The simple though general conceptual framework developed here should be useful for the understanding and the exact calculation of diffusion-weighting in NMR sequences using frequency-swept pulses.
authors.affiliation: Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique (CEA), Institut d'Imagerie Biomédicale (I2BM), Molecular Imaging Research Center (MIRCen), 18 route du Panorama, BP n degrees 6, Bât. 61, F-92265 Fontenay-aux-Roses, France. julien.valette@cea.fr
authors.forename: Julien
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Valette
authors.forename: Franck
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Lethimonnier
authors.forename: Vincent
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Lebon
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003198:Computer Simulation; D038524:Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D007834:Lasers; D016014:Linear Models; D017711:Nonlinear Dynamics