A method of removing an imaging artifact in a medical image, including
obtaining a first plurality of images, the first plurality of images
collectively defining a first image volume; filtering the first plurality
of images to create a second plurality of images, each image in the
second plurality of images comprising an average of at least two images
in the first plurality of images; selecting a first image from the first
plurality of images; adding a lost noise image to a second image in the
second plurality of images to create a noise restored image, the second
image in the second plurality of images corresponding to the first image
in the first plurality of images; determining a gradient image based on
pixel values in the second plurality of images, the gradient image
comprising a gradient value at each pixel location in the second image;
and combining, based on the determined gradient image, the first image
and the noise restored image to obtain a corrected image that does not
contain the imaging artifact.