dwiextract

Synopsis

Extract diffusion-weighted volumes, b=0 volumes, or certain shells from a DWI dataset

Usage

dwiextract [ options ]  input output
  • input: the input DW image.
  • output: the output image (diffusion-weighted volumes by default).

Example usages

  • Calculate the mean b=0 image from a 4D DWI series:

    $ dwiextract dwi.mif - -bzero | mrmath - mean mean_bzero.mif -axis 3
    

    The dwiextract command extracts all volumes for which the b-value is (approximately) zero; the resulting 4D image can then be provided to the mrmath command to calculate the mean intensity across volumes for each voxel.

Options

  • -bzero Output b=0 volumes (instead of the diffusion weighted volumes, if -singleshell is not specified).
  • -no_bzero Output only non b=0 volumes (default, if -singleshell is not specified).
  • -singleshell Force a single-shell (single non b=0 shell) output. This will include b=0 volumes, if present. Use with -bzero to enforce presence of b=0 volumes (error if not present) or with -no_bzero to exclude them.

DW gradient table import options

  • -grad file Provide the diffusion-weighted gradient scheme used in the acquisition in a text file. This should be supplied as a 4xN text file with each line is in the format [ X Y Z b ], where [ X Y Z ] describe the direction of the applied gradient, and b gives the b-value in units of s/mm^2. If a diffusion gradient scheme is present in the input image header, the data provided with this option will be instead used.
  • -fslgrad bvecs bvals Provide the diffusion-weighted gradient scheme used in the acquisition in FSL bvecs/bvals format files. If a diffusion gradient scheme is present in the input image header, the data provided with this option will be instead used.

DW shell selection options

  • -shells b-values specify one or more b-values to use during processing, as a comma-separated list of the desired approximate b-values (b-values are clustered to allow for small deviations). Note that some commands are incompatible with multiple b-values, and will report an error if more than one b-value is provided.
    WARNING: note that, even though the b=0 volumes are never referred to as shells in the literature, they still have to be explicitly included in the list of b-values as provided to the -shell option! Several algorithms which include the b=0 volumes in their computations may otherwise return an undesired result.

DW gradient table export options

  • -export_grad_mrtrix path export the diffusion-weighted gradient table to file in MRtrix format
  • -export_grad_fsl bvecs_path bvals_path export the diffusion-weighted gradient table to files in FSL (bvecs / bvals) format

Options for importing phase-encode tables

  • -import_pe_table file import a phase-encoding table from file
  • -import_pe_eddy config indices import phase-encoding information from an EDDY-style config / index file pair

Options for selecting volumes based on phase-encoding

  • -pe desc select volumes with a particular phase encoding; this can be three comma-separated values (for i,j,k components of vector direction) or four (direction & total readout time)

Stride options

  • -strides spec specify the strides of the output data in memory; either as a comma-separated list of (signed) integers, or as a template image from which the strides shall be extracted and used. The actual strides produced will depend on whether the output image format can support it.

Standard options

  • -info display information messages.
  • -quiet do not display information messages or progress status; alternatively, this can be achieved by setting the MRTRIX_QUIET environment variable to a non-empty string.
  • -debug display debugging messages.
  • -force force overwrite of output files (caution: using the same file as input and output might cause unexpected behaviour).
  • -nthreads number use this number of threads in multi-threaded applications (set to 0 to disable multi-threading).
  • -config key value (multiple uses permitted) temporarily set the value of an MRtrix config file entry.
  • -help display this information page and exit.
  • -version display version information and exit.

References

Tournier, J.-D.; Smith, R. E.; Raffelt, D.; Tabbara, R.; Dhollander, T.; Pietsch, M.; Christiaens, D.; Jeurissen, B.; Yeh, C.-H. & Connelly, A. MRtrix3: A fast, flexible and open software framework for medical image processing and visualisation. NeuroImage, 2019, 202, 116137


Author: David Raffelt (david.raffelt@florey.edu.au) and Thijs Dhollander (thijs.dhollander@gmail.com) and Robert E. Smith (robert.smith@florey.edu.au)

Copyright: Copyright (c) 2008-2023 the MRtrix3 contributors.

This Source Code Form is subject to the terms of the Mozilla Public License, v. 2.0. If a copy of the MPL was not distributed with this file, You can obtain one at http://mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/.

Covered Software is provided under this License on an “as is” basis, without warranty of any kind, either expressed, implied, or statutory, including, without limitation, warranties that the Covered Software is free of defects, merchantable, fit for a particular purpose or non-infringing. See the Mozilla Public License v. 2.0 for more details.

For more details, see http://www.mrtrix.org/.