A gradient scheme suitable for localized shimming and in vivo 1H/31P STEAM and ISIS NMR spectroscopy.

A gradient scheme is presented which may be used for STEAM or ISIS localization. One application of the scheme is to perform single-shot STEAM shimming prior to data acquisition with STEAM and ISIS, using identical gradient amplitudes and durations. Using conventional STEAM to shim for ISIS can produce line-shape distortions induced by different eddy currents in the two sequences; with this gradient scheme the problem is minimized. Line-shape improvements of STEAM and ISIS localized data obtained after volume localized shimming with the proposed STEAM sequence are demonstrated. The localization performance of the STEAM and ISIS sequences are demonstrated on phantoms and in vivo for 1H and 31P metabolites.