Field camera input to virtual phantom (ViP) scanner acquisitions for quality assurance of derived MRI quantities: first implementation and proof-of-principle.

Introduction: Quality assurance (QA) of measurements derived from MRI can require complicated test phantoms. This work introduces a new QA concept using gradient and transmit RF recordings by a limited field camera (FC) to govern the previous Virtual Phantom (ViP) method. The purpose is to describe the first technical implementation of combined FC+ViP, and illustrate its performance in examples, including quantitative first-pass myocardial perfusion.

Materials and methods: The new QA concept starts with a synthetic test object (STO) representing some arbitrary test input. Using recordings of the unmodified standard sequence by a gradient and RF waveform camera (FC), ViP calculates by Bloch simulation the continuous RF signal emitted by the STO during this sequence (hence FC+ViP). During nominally identical repetition of the sequence acquisition, ViP transmits the RF signal for scanner reception, reconstruction and any further parametric derivations by the unmodified standard scanner image reconstruction and analysis software.

Results: The scanner outputs were compared against the input STOs.

Conclusion: First proof-of-principle was discussed and supported by correlation between scanner outputs and the input STO. The work makes no claim that its examples are valid QA methods. It concludes by proposing a new industrial standard for QA without the FC.