Use, misuse, and abuse of apparent diffusion coefficients

The notion of effective, time-dependent or, equivalently, apparent diffu- sion coefficient (ADC) and its use for characterization of porous media are revisited. It is argued that the dynamic ADC, quantifying the mean-square displacement of spin-bearing particles, should not be confused with its counterpart measured by a pulsed gradient spin echo technique. The former is an intrinsic characteristic of the medium, independ- ent of the applied magnetic field. In contrast, the spin-echo ADC depends on the experi- mental setup (e.g., gradient intensity and temporal profile), raising potential ambiguities in the interpretation of diffusion-weighted measurements, which may be strongly misleading when the Gaussian phase approximation (GPA) does not hold. The oversim- plified use of a single b-value is criticized. Several fitting models beyond the GPA are discussed. 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Concepts Magn Reson Part A 36A: 24-35, 2010.

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