Zhang Xiaoliang, Ugurbil Kamil, Sainati Robert, Chen Wei
Center for Magnetic Resonance Research, Department of Radiology, the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA.
IEEE Trans Biomed Eng. 2005 Mar;52(3):495-504. doi: 10.1109/TBME.2004.842968.
As an extension of the previously developed microstrip transmission line (MTL) RF coil design, a high-frequency RF volume coil using multiple inverted MTL (iMTL) resonators for human head imaging at high magnetic field strength of 7 tesla (T) is reported. Compared to conventional MTL resonators, iMTL resonators can operate at higher frequency with lower losses and, thus, are suitable for designs of high-frequency RF volume coils with large coil size for human MR imaging and spectroscopy at high fields. An approach using capacitive terminations was analyzed and applied to the design of the iMTL volume coil for improving RF field homogeneity and broadening frequency-tuning range. A performance-comparison study was conducted between the prototype iMTL volume coil and a custom-built TEM volume coil at 7 T. The iMTL volume coil presents a comparable SNR and intrinsic B1 homogeneity to the TEM volume coil. Phantom and the human head images acquired using the iMTL volume coil are also presented. The proposed iMTL volume coil provides an efficient and alternative solution to design high-frequency and large-size volume coils for human MR applications at very high fields.
作为先前开发的微带传输线(MTL)射频线圈设计的扩展,本文报道了一种用于7特斯拉(T)高磁场强度下人体头部成像的高频射频容积线圈,该线圈采用多个倒置微带传输线(iMTL)谐振器。与传统的MTL谐振器相比,iMTL谐振器能够在更高频率下以更低损耗工作,因此适用于设计用于高场人体磁共振成像和波谱分析的大尺寸高频射频容积线圈。分析了一种使用电容终端的方法,并将其应用于iMTL容积线圈的设计中,以提高射频场均匀性并拓宽频率调谐范围。在7 T下对iMTL容积线圈原型和定制的TEM容积线圈进行了性能比较研究。iMTL容积线圈与TEM容积线圈相比,具有相当的信噪比和固有B1均匀性。还展示了使用iMTL容积线圈采集的体模和人体头部图像。所提出的iMTL容积线圈为在超高场下设计用于人体磁共振应用的高频大尺寸容积线圈提供了一种有效且替代的解决方案。