3D PROPELLER-Based Diffusion Weighted Imaging

Introduction PROPELLER [1] and Turboprop DWI [2] have shown advantages over traditional EPI DWI which include higher resolution, relative insensitivity to motion and robustness to off-resonance. In this work, we propose a new sequence dubbed TURBINE (TURBoprop IN Elevation), which adapts the TurboProp scheme to 3D DWI imaging. The potential benefits of this approach over EPI and turboprop include higher SNR efficiency, lower SAR and MTS, reduced off-resonance artifacts and 3D phase correction. The method also offers the potential for 3D zero padding and 3D motion correction although these were not part of this study. Methods The TURBINE trajectory is based on the turboprop sequence where the gradient echoes are placed in the slice encoding direction (Fig 1a). The kz encoding positions are spaced by (1/slab thickness) instead of (1/FOV), greatly increasing the speed of the kz trajectory, thus minimizing warping by factors of ~20.