Open AccessActively decoupled transmit–receive coil‐pair for mouse brain MRI
Author(s) -
Garbow Joel R.,
Mcintosh Charlie,
Conradi Mark S.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
concepts in magnetic resonance part b: magnetic resonance engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.286
H-Index - 32
eISSN - 1552-504X
pISSN - 1552-5031
DOI - 10.1002/cmr.b.20124
Subject(s) - electromagnetic coil , amplifier , decoupling (probability) , scanner , radiofrequency coil , diode , computer science , orientation (vector space) , pin diode , physics , electrical engineering , nuclear magnetic resonance , acoustics , optics , optoelectronics , engineering , bandwidth (computing) , telecommunications , control engineering , geometry , mathematics
A low‐cost, high‐performance RF coil‐pair for MR imaging of mouse brain is described. A surface receiving coil is used for high spin‐sensitivity, whereas a larger transmit coil, located outside the mouse holder, delivers good B 1 uniformity across the brain with reasonable efficiency. The volume coil is constructed with an open architecture, making experimental setup easy and providing clear access to the head of the mouse. Each coil is switched between active and inactive modes using PIN diodes driven by a small amplifier external to the spectrometer. Because of this active decoupling, there is no requirement for orthogonal orientation of the coils. The coil pair is platform independent, requiring only a transmit/receive (T/R) signal to switch the amplifier that drives the PIN diodes and can therefore be used with virtually any commercial or home‐built MR scanner. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Concepts Magn Reson Part B (Magn Reson Engineering) 33B: 252–259, 2008