Noise-reduced synthetic T2 weighted images

A multi-echo magnetic resonance imaging sequence is implemented such that a radio frequency receiver (34) receives magnetic resonance signals during each of a plurality of magnetic resonance echoes. The resonance data received during each echo are digitized and the resultant echo data are stored in a corresponding echo memory (40, 42). The locations of the data within the memories are brought into registration (52) such that corresponding data in each memory is disposed at the same memory address. Because data from later echoes tends to be weaker or at a lower magnitude, the magnitude of the data stored in each memory is normalized (60). The phase of the data in each memory is brought into coordination by a zero order phase correction (70). A high pass filter (84) and a complementary low pass filter (86) separate complementary portions of the data from the memories. The separated portions are combined into a single synthesizied data set for storage in memory (82). The syntheized data are Fourier transformed (100) to produce a synthetic image which has selected characteristics of an early echo image, e.g. high resolution, and selected characteristics of a late echo image, e.g. good T2 contrast. In this manner, the synthetic image has properties or characteristics which render it more diagnostically valuable than either an early or late echo image.