Markus W. May1, Sam-Luca J.D. Hansen1, Nicolas Kutscha1, Gurinder Kaur Multani1, Mirsad Mahmutovic1, Matthäus Poniatowski1, Rene Gumbrecht2, Ralph Kimmlingen2, Markus Adriany2, Yulin Chang3, Bastien Guerin4, Christina Triantafyllou2, Lawrence L. Wald4, and Boris Keil1
1Institute of Medical Physics and Radiation Protection (IMPS), TH Mittelhessen University of Applied Sciences, Giessen, Germany, 2Siemens Healthcare GmbH, Erlangen, Germany, 3Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc., Malvern, PA, United States, 4A.A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Dept of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
1Institute of Medical Physics and Radiation Protection (IMPS), TH Mittelhessen University of Applied Sciences, Giessen, Germany, 2Siemens Healthcare GmbH, Erlangen, Germany, 3Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc., Malvern, PA, United States, 4A.A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Dept of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States
A 16chTx
/ 64chRx head-neck array coil was designed to increase patient
comfort, constructed to extend the coil coverage, and validated at 7T
ultra-high field MRI.
(A,B) Anterior and posterior housings segment of
the 16chTx /64chRx head-neck coil maintaining a constant
offset of the transmit to the receiver loops. (C,D) populated coil array with cut-outs
for eyes and mouth facilitate visual stimulation and free breathing,
respectively. Each Tx loop consists of 7 -13 capacitors, a PIN diode circuitry
for active tuning, and a symmetrical drive port. (D) Final enclosed coil
plugged into the 7T scanner’s patient bed illustrating the goal of making a
form factor matching what is clinically used at 1.5T and 3T.
Sagittal 7T GRE in vivo image acquired with the constructed 16chTx /64chRx
head-neck coil to demonstrate the extended coil coverage (TR/TE/α:40ms/5ms/20,
matrix: 344x344, resolution: 0.3 x 0.3 x 5mm, BW: 320Px/Hz).