A 3-COMPONENT MODEL FOR MAGNETIZATION-TRANSFER - SOLUTION BY PROJECTION-OPERATOR TECHNIQUE, AND APPLICATION TO CARTILAGE

A projection-operator technique is applied to a general three-componen t model for magnetization transfer, extending our previous two-compone nt model [R. S. Adler and H. N. Yeung, J. Magn. Reson. A 104, 321 (199 3), and H. N. Yeung, R. S. Adler, and S. D. Swanson, J. Magn. Reson. A 106, 37 (1994)], The PO technique provides an elegant means of derivi ng a simple, effective rate equation in which there is natural separat ion of relaxation and source terms and allows incorporation of Redfiel d-Provotorov theory without any additional assumptions or restrictive conditions, The PO technique is extended to incorporate more general, multicomponent models, The three-component model is used to fit experi mental data from samples of human hyaline cartilage and fibrocartilage , The fits of the three-component model are compared to the fits of th e two-component model. (C) 1996 Academic Press, Inc.