Diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) is a powerful non-invasive tool which is widely used in clinical routine. Mostly, apparent diffusion coefficient maps are acquired, which cannot be directly related to cellular structure. More recently it was shown that DWI is able to reconstruct pore shapes using a specialized magnetic field gradient scheme so that cell size distributions may be obtained. So far, artificial systems have been used for experimental demonstration without extraporal signal components and relatively low gradient amplitudes. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the feasibility of diffusion pore imaging in the presence of extraporal fluids and to develop correction methods for effects arising from extraporal signal contributions. Monte Carlo simulations and validation experiments on a 14.1 T spectrometer with a dedicated diffusion probe head were performed. Both by using a filter gradient approach suppressing extraporal signal components as well as using postprocessing methods relying on the Gaussian phase approximation, it was possible to reconstruct pore space functions in the presence of extraporal fluids with little to no deviations from the expectations. These results may be a significant step towards application of diffusion pore imaging to biological samples. While still ultra-high gradients are required, this problem may be mitigated by recent developments in the field of local gradient coils for human applications.
