Christoph Michael Schildknecht1 and Klaas Paul Pruessmann1
1Institute for Biomedical Engineering, ETH Zurich and University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
1Institute for Biomedical Engineering, ETH Zurich and University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
This work reports
additive manufacturing of MRI coils based on 3D printing and electroplating of conductive
polymer. The proposed approach greatly simplifies the fabrication of complex coil and array geometries with a high degree of accuracy and reproducibility.
The process has three
major steps. First, the design is made in a CAD software. Then the part is 3D
printed and finally the conductive polymer is electroplated with copper to
increase its conductivity.
In the top row are
renderings shown for the intended wrist coil. In the bottom row is the actual
3D printed and electroplated coil displayed. Not only does the fabricated coil
look similar as in the renderings, they also closely match the geometrical dimension
as specified in the CAD.
