Advanced 3D tailored RF pulse for signal loss recovery in T2*-weighted functional MRI

*contrast, used in blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) fMRI, is coupled to the signal loss artifact caused by through-plane dephasing between excitation and data acquisition. Various methods have been shown to be effective at recovering signal loss, but they typically involve high cost in different aspects of the fMRI study. In particular, using three-dimensional tailored RF pulse to “precompensate” for the dephasing (hereafter, 3DTRF method) [1] was demonstrated to be very effective, but the pulses are exceedingly long, and their slice selectivity is limited and very susceptible to off-resonance distortion. We propose major advances in the 3DTRF method that lead to multiple-fold pulse length reduction and improved slice selection, while effective signal recovery is achieved. We demonstrate signal recovery on an inferior brain slice, using a 3DTRF pulse that is only 15.4 ms long.