Multi-gradient echo with susceptibility inhomogeneity compensation (MGESIC): Demonstration of fMRI in the olfactory cortex at 3.0 T

Short image acquisition times and sensitivity to magnetic susceptibility favor the use of gradient echo imaging methods in functional MRI (fMRI). However, magnetic susceptibility effects attributed to air-tissue interfaces also lead to severe signal loss in images of the large inferior frontal and lateral temporal cortices of the human brain, which renders these regions inaccessible to fMRI. The signal loss is caused by the local field gradients in the slice selection direction. A multi-gradient echo with magnetic susceptibility inhomogeneity compensation method (MGESIC) is proposed to overcome this problem. The MGESIC method effectively corrects the susceptibility artifacts and maintains the advantages of gradient echo methods to both BOLD sensitivity and fast image acquisition. The effectiveness of the MGESIC method is demonstrated by fMRI experimental results within the olfactory cortex.