Technical Details:
A method of determining longitudinal spin relaxation time or imaging longitudinal spin relaxation time or producing images which substantially reflect longitudinal spin relaxation time contrast. The method includes establishing a main magnetic field with respect to a specimen and employing a plurality of magnetic resonance (MR) gradients to spatially encode magnetic resonance signals from at least one position within the specimen. A plurality of pairs of pulses included a first radio frequency (RF) pulse having a first predetermined flip-angle and second RF pulse having a second predetermined flip-angle, which is different from the first predetermined flip-angle, are employed. One of the first RF pulses is applied to the specimen to produce a corresponding first MR signal and first MR information is acquired from the first MR signal corresponding to the RF pulse. The first MR signal is dephased and one of the second RF pulses is applied to the specimen to produce a corresponding second MR signal. Second MR information is acquired from the second MR signal corresponding to the second RF pulse and the first and second MR information is delivered to a processor. The processor determines a ratio from the first and second MR information and determines the longitudinal spin relaxation time from the ratio. Associated apparatus is disclosed.
