Short TE phosphorus spectroscopy using a spin‐echo pulse

In vivo phosphorus spectroscopy requires very short acquisition delays in order to capture the signal from components with short transverse relaxation times (T₂). The echo time typical of standard slice selective spin‐echo pulses are too long for this application, so hard pulse, free induction decay (FID) acquisitions have frequently been used instead. With FID, however, there is an interval between the time of coherence and data acquisition (acquisition delay), with resulting baseline distortions. In this paper we describe the design of a new short TE, slice‐selective, composite spin‐echo pulse with echo times as short as 2.5 ms. With a long TR, fully relaxed, multislice spectra can be collected. This technique will be useful for assessing, in vivo, changes in brain phospholipid activity associated with psychiatric and neurological diseases.