Preprint
Regularized joint reconstruction and slab combination for accelerated three-dimensional multi-slab diffusion-weighted imaging using multi-scale energy models
ArXiv.org
Cornell University
06/01/2026
DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2606.01606
Abstract
This work presents Energy-based Profile Encoding, EPEN, a joint reconstruction framework for high-resolution diffusion-weighted MRI from undersampled 3D multi-slab k-space acquisitions, designed to suppress slab-boundary artifacts while preserving fine anatomical detail. EPEN formulates the multi-slab acquisition process using a bilinear forward model in which both the diffusion-weighted image volume and slab excitation profiles are treated as unknown variables. Reconstruction is posed as a maximum a posteriori optimization problem with three components: a Gaussian data-fidelity term enforcing consistency with the acquired k-space measurements, a CNN-based deep energy prior that represents the negative log distribution of clean diffusion-weighted images, and a quadratic regularization term that constrains the estimated slab profiles toward an initial profile estimate. The gradient of the learned energy prior guides accelerated reconstruction toward an artifact-free image distribution. The resulting nonconvex objective is solved using alternating minimization, with image-volume updates performed through a majorize-minimize scheme using conjugate-gradient optimization and slab-profile updates estimated by regularized least squares. Across multiple acceleration factors and slab configurations, EPEN substantially reduced slab-boundary artifacts compared with conventional slab-boundary correction methods, while improving structural consistency and preserving diffusion-weighted contrast. These results demonstrate that EPEN enables robust joint 3D multi-slab diffusion MRI reconstruction and slab-profile correction within a unified optimization framework supported by deep energy-based image priors.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Regularized joint reconstruction and slab combination for accelerated three-dimensional multi-slab diffusion-weighted imaging using multi-scale energy models
- Creators
- Reza GhorbaniJyothi Rikhab ChandChu-Yu LeeMathews JacobMerry Mani
- Resource Type
- Preprint
- Publication Details
- ArXiv.org
- DOI
- 10.48550/arxiv.2606.01606
- ISSN
- 2331-8422
- Publisher
- Cornell University; Ithaca, New York
- Language
- English
- Date posted
- 06/01/2026
- Academic Unit
- Radiology
- Record Identifier
- 9985167583902771
Metrics
6 Record Views