Annual course improving your MRI understanding. 

Course title: Magnetic Resonance Imaging Basics

Content and format: The course provides a basis for understanding MRI measurements, pitfalls and literature. The course covers introductory MRI acquisition in a series of ~6 weekly interactive lectures starting November 4th, 2016. These cover MR basics, acquisition methods and parameters with a focus on understanding. Active participation is required.

The course starts at a level requiring little or no MR experience, and a technical background is not required. The target audience is employees and students at the MR department but the course is open and free for external participants. DRCMR employees, students and co-workers are given priority if the number of participants is limited due to space constraints.

The course covers the basics needed to possibly later follow the independent and more technical spring course Medical Magnetic Resonance Imaging offered as part of the Medicine&Technology program at the Technical University of Denmark, and which is also available for non-DTU-students (offered under "Open University").

Dates, time, place: The course starts Friday afternoon 1:15-3:45pm, November 4th, 2016. It continues approximately weekly (same time) until Christmas (see lecture plan below). The venue is the DRCMR conference room.

Registration: The course is free and open, but you need to inform Karam Sidaros (non-DRCMR participants only, ) and Lars () about your affiliation and incentive to take the course. You will then be added to the course mailing list.

Literature and software: The course is initially based on notes http://eprints.drcmr.dk/37/ (also available in Danish). Other course notes, slides and relevant articles are provided during the course.

Credit: The course has a workload corresponding to 1.5 ECTS points. You do not, however, automatically get credit for the course in any education. You can get a certificate and apply for credit at your school, but be aware that no general evaluation is planned, which may be required for a credit-bearing course. A brief informal exam focused on your particular interests can possibly be arranged on an individual basis upon request (by default only offered to DRCMR participants, who may also by appointment hand in a report to get more study credits). This is required for the organizer to recommend 2 ECTS in total (up to 2.5 depending on assignments/exams).

Language: The course language is English. Participants are welcome to respond and ask questions in Danish, if preferred.

Organizer and lecturer:  Lars G. Hanson (senior scientist at DRCMR, and associate professor at DTU).

Preliminary outline divided on weeks (more precise updates are sent to participants):

Friday November 4th, part 1:

• Sections "Magnetic Resonance" until "Sequences" in MR notes are discussed during the coming few weeks (the English and Danish versions are similar). Protons, spin, net magnetization, precession, radio waves, resonance, relaxation, rotating and stationary frames of reference, T1 and T2.

Friday November 11th, part 2:

• Relaxation time weighting. Sequence diagrams, contrast
• Sequence building blocks: Inversion, saturation, lipid/water suppression.

Friday November 18th, part 3:

• Dephasing, refocusing, T2*, spin echoes
• Magnetic interaction with tissue
• Fast low angle shot (FLASH)

MR notes from "Imaging" and beyond are covered during the coming weeks.

Friday November 25th, part 4:

• Shimming
• Contrast overview, contrast agents
• Gradients, slice selection
• phase, phase-rolls

Friday December 2nd: No teaching due to DRCMR Christmas Symposium.

Friday December 9th, part 5:

• Imaging and k-space. Echo time revisited.
• k-space trajectories, artifacts (distortions, ghosting and aliasing), noise and image quality quantification.

Friday December 16th, part 6:

• Flow and diffusion weighting, BOLD fMRI and/or spectroscopy depending on wishes.

The lecture plan is adjusted with respect to both subjects and timing during the course, and to some degree based on participant wishes. Updates are distributed to registered participants (see above).