Patent ID: 8600475

Claim:
In a magnetic resonance imaging system having a computer-based control apparatus that controls the timing of the taking of magnetic resonance images based on a muscular state of a body part of a living subject, the improvement comprising: a set of instructions recorded on a machine-readable medium, the set of instructions when operating configured to control the operation of the system in response to two conditions to provide two mutually exclusive outcomes, so as to: determine whether or not a muscular condition of a body part of a living subject is within an acceptable range; permit the taking of a magnetic resonance image (a “shot”) when both said muscular condition is within said acceptable range and when, for all shots after a first shot, an elapsed time since the last shot was taken is at least N * T 1 , where T 1 is a time constant representative of a decay rate for a specimen of interest in a magnetic resonance process and N represents a numerical value greater than one, and N * T 1 is of sufficient duration to allow a plurality of nuclear spins in said specimen of interest to decay back to a statistically defined spin state after the last shot; and apply a zero flip angle shot to leave said spin state of said plurality of nuclear spins undisturbed when at least one of said muscular conditions is not within said acceptable range and, for all shots after a first shot, said condition that said time elapsed since said last shot is at least N * T 1 is not satisfied; and said set of instructions configured to provide as output at least one of an image displayed to a user, a stored image, and transmission of an image to a remote location for storing or viewing.