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Abstract

A system, program product, and method to determine water, fat, and transverse relaxation time constants in MRI scanning are provided. A method includes initiating readout gradient pulses to collect echo signals with identical phase encoded gradients to thereby produce a plurality of images, instead of a single image with a single readout gradient. A receiver bandwidth used for collecting the echo signals can be determined responsive to an acquisition matrix size along the readout axis and a time duration for water and fat signals to evolve by a preselected phase angle. In a modified FSE implementation, for example, a method includes using readout gradient pulses that use substantially all of the echo spacing time periods between successive refocus RF pulses. By exploiting the phase and the amplitude relationship between the images, the method can include processing the images to generate separate water and fat images, as well as quantitative maps of transverse relaxation time constants.

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