Ghosting in MRI due to modulation of k-space data can be caused by mot
ion of the subject or characteristics of the sequence. A general solut
ion for 2DFT MRI that reduces ghosting without causal modeling is pres
ented, Separate image data sets are acquired in which the phase and fr
equency directions are swapped, In these two data sets, the image sign
al is correlated, whereas the ghost signals are not, By taking a corre
lation of these two data sets, an image with greatly reduced ghosting
is obtained. The reduction is shown to depend both on the correct sign
al intensity of the image, as well as the ghost intensity in the ghost
ed region. The reduction approaches 100% in regions of low image signa
l, and is more moderate in regions of higher image signal. The process
was applied to conventional spin-echo, fast-spin-echo, and gradient e
cho imaging of volunteers and a phantom. Results of a reader study of
the volunteer images reflected a significant overall reduction of ghos
ting artifacts in all volunteer experiments.