4 T actively detunable transmit/receive transverse electromagnetic coil and 4-channel receive-only phased array for (1)H human brain studies

Abstract

The design and construction of a 4 T transverse electromagnetic (TEM) transmit/receive head coil and a four-channel phased array receive-only RF system are described. To enable both high-resolution imaging of the entire brain and high-resolution spectroscopic imaging, active PIN diode decoupling was used in both the TEM resonator and each surface coil in the array. This configuration allows for both transmission and reception from the volume coil as well as reception from the phased array. The surface coils were decoupled by overlapping the coils and using preamplifier decoupling. Since at high frequencies construction of a lumped element matching quarter wavelength transformer, an important component of the preamplifier decoupling, becomes difficult, a transmission line approach was used. The system was tested and compared to a TEM volume transmit/receive head coil. A four- to sixfold improvement in signal-to-noise ratio from the sensitive volume of the array was achieved.