The neuroimaging of humans using 7T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has been conducted using phased array (PA) coils with different numbers of receiving channels. PA coils with a high number of channels may offer parallel imaging (PI) with a high reduction (R)-factor, which is enabled via under-sampling and coil geometry (g) factor, increasing the radiofrequency signal sensitivity provided by a small coil. The goals of this study were to assess and validate the coil performance of PA coils with different numbers of receiver (Rx)-channels in and to propose the coil selection guidelines by visualizing 7T brain images. The combined magnetic flux density (||B₁||) distributions of four configurations of PA coils—4-, 8-, 12-, and 16-channel Rx-only mode under the local transmit (Tx) mode of birdcage coils—were evaluated using electromagnetic (EM) calculations. These four configurations of PA coils and a local Tx coil were designed and built for a 7T MRI experiment. For 7T brain imaging experiments, all PA coils with (w/) and without (w/o) R-factors were compared in terms of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and spatial noise variation (SNV). EM simulation results clearly demonstrated that PA coils with a high number of Rx channels showed more homogeneously distributed ||B₁|| fields than a PA coils with a low number of Rx coils. The results of this study demonstrate that a collection of smaller surface coils can contribute to high RF signal sensitivity in terms of the anatomical coverage of the brain and may facilitate PI. With further improvement in coil technology, researchers and clinicians will be provided with PA coils with different numbers of channels, which can ensure the optimum SNR and PI benefits for 7T brain MR imaging.

The popularity of patch antennas in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has reduced because of the large size required for patch antennae to resonate. Since the size of the patch antenna is associated with the wavelength and the wavelengths that are used in MRI are substantially large, large antennas are used. Methods of reducing patch antenna sizes have been proposed; however, these methods reduce the penetration depth and uniformity. In this study, we reduced the area of the patch antenna by 30% by folding the ground and patch planes in a zigzag pattern. The patch antenna produced two main resonant modes. The first mode produced a uniform magnetic field that was used for MRI. The second mode produced a strong and focused electric (|E|)-field, which was used for radiofrequency (RF) heating. Furthermore, we explored the use of a combination of two patch antennas aligned along the z-axis to provide a circular uniform magnetic flux density (|B₁|) field at 300 MHz, which corresponds to the Larmor frequency in the 7T MRI system. In addition, the patch antenna configuration will be used for RF heating hyperthermia operating at 1.06 GHz. The target object was a small rat with insertion of colon cancer. Using the proposed configuration, we achieved |B₁|-field uniformity with a standard deviation of 3% and a temperature increment of 1 °C in the mimic cancer tissue.

Capacitive radiofrequency (RF) hyperthermia suffers from excessive temperature rise near the electrodes and poorly localized heat transfer to the deep-seated tumor region even though it is known to have potential to cure ill-conditioned tumors. To better localize heat transfer to the deep-seated target region in which electrical conductivity is elevated by nanoparticle mediation, two-channel capacitive RF heating has been tried on a phantom. We made a tissue-mimicking phantom consisting of two compartments, a tumor-tissue-mimicking insert against uniform background agarose. The tumor-tissue-mimicking insert was made to have higher electrical conductivity than the normal-tissue-mimicking background by applying magnetic nanoparticle suspension to the insert. Two electrode pairs were attached on the phantom surface by equal-angle separation to apply RF electric field to the phantom. To better localize heat transfer to the tumor-tissue-mimicking insert, RF power with a frequency of 26 MHz was delivered to the two channels in a time-multiplexed way. To monitor the temperature rise inside the phantom, MR thermometry was performed at a 3T MRI intermittently during the RF heating. Finite-difference-time-domain (FDTD) electromagnetic and thermal simulations on the phantom model were also performed to verify the experimental results. As compared to the one-channel RF heating, the two-channel RF heating with time-multiplexed driving improved the spatial localization of heat transfer to the tumor-tissue-mimicking region in both the simulation and experiment. The two-channel RF heating also reduced the temperature rise near the electrodes significantly. Time-multiplexed two-channel capacitive RF heating has the capability to better localize heat transfer to the nanoparticle-mediated tumor region which has higher electrical conductivity than the background normal tissues.

In this simulation study, we describe a microstrip transmission line (MTL) array coil, designed to provide a uniform |B₁| field along the spinal cord in 7 T MRI. The coil structure was designed by segmenting the spinal cord into four sections according to its shape. The geometry and properties of the MTL coils were optimized individually to obtain a uniform |B₁| field distributed according to the shape of the spinal cord in each section. On combining the individually-optimized MTL coils, we present a microstrip array design that produces a highly uniform |B₁| field for the whole spinal cord. Furthermore, with this design, the |B₁­| field contour lines followed the shape of the spinal cord. A comparison with a standard 8-channel loop array coil shows that our design produces a more uniform |B₁­| field in the target imaging area, demonstrating its potential for spinal cord imaging.

This study analyzed asymmetrical designs of birdcage (BC) coils, for which the conventional shape of the BC is modified in order to improve field intensity and uniformity in the brain region for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at 4.7T. Typically the BC coil has insufficient field uniformity when operating at higher frequencies such as 200 MHz, corresponding to the Larmor frequency at 4.7T, due to the interaction between the electrical properties of body tissue and the propagated magnetic field wavelength. We propose a new design of BC coil, which consists of different ring diameters and leg width. The performance of proposed designs was compared to that of a head-size BC coil. Using finite-difference time-domain simulations to obtain the |$B_1^{+}$| fields for a human model, we demonstrate that the proposed designs can achieve better field intensity and uniformity compared with other BC coil designs.

In high field MRI capable of multi-channel radio frequency (RF) transmission, B 1 shimming is a time-consuming job because conventional B 1 shimming techniques require B 1 mapping for each channel. After acquiring the complex-numbered B 1 field maps, the optimal amplitude and phase of the driving RF pulse are determined for each channel to maximize the B 1 field uniformity in conventional B 1 shimming. However, time-consuming B 1 shimming procedures at the pre-scan may not be tolerated in the clinical imaging in which patient throughput is one of the important factors. To avoid the time-consuming B 1 mapping, the first spin echo and the stimulated echo were repeatedly acquired in the slice-selective stimulated echo sequence without imaging gradients. A cost function of the amplitudes and phases of the driving RF pulse for every channel was defined in a way that the ratio between the spin echo and stimulated echo amplitudes rapidly converged to √ 2. The amplitude and phase of the driving RF pulse were iteratively modified over the repeating RF pulse sequence so that the cost function was minimized. From the finite-difference-time-domain (FDTD) electromagnetic field simulations with a human body model placed in a birdcage coil operating at 3 T, it was observed that the RF pulse calibration with iterative cost function minimization can give improvement of B1 field uniformity as well as flip-angle calibration. The experiments at 3 T also showed improvement of RF field uniformity in the phantom imaging studies. Since the proposed RF pulse calibration is not based on B 1 mapping, the RF pulse calibration time could be much shorter than the B 1-mapping based methods. The proposed method is expected to be a practical substitute for the B 1-mapping-based B 1 shimming methods when long pre-scan time is not tolerable.