Patent ID: 7847545

Claim:
An MRI apparatus comprising: a plurality of gradient coils positioned around a bore of a magnet; an RF coil assembly coupled to a pulse generator to emit RF pulse sequences and arranged to receive resulting MR signals from a subject of interest; a plurality of magnetic field monitoring devices positioned within the bore; a system control coupled to the plurality of gradient coils, the RF coil assembly, and the plurality of magnetic field monitoring devices, wherein the system control is programmed to: acquire a first set of data and a second set of data via the RF coil assembly during a scan; acquire a third set of data and a fourth set of data via the plurality of magnetic field monitoring devices during the scan; form a first single data set from the first and third sets of data; form a second single data set from the second and fourth sets of data; and reconstruct a phase contrast image based on the first and second single data sets to correct for spatially-dependent background phase variations.