Pattern pulses: design of arbitrary excitation profiles as a function of pulse amplitude and offset

A novel class of pulses is presented which can be regarded as a generalization of both frequency-selective pulses and B₁-selective pulses. The excitation profile of these pulses forms a pre-defined pattern in two dimensions, which are spanned by pulse offset and radio-frequency (RF) amplitude. The presented pulses were designed numerically based on principles of optimal control theory. For simple test patterns, we demonstrate the flexibility of this approach by simulations and experiments. This previously unknown flexibility may trigger novel applications in NMR spectroscopy and imaging. As a first practical application, we demonstrate a direct approach for calibrating RF pulses.