title: Single-chip pulse programmer for magnetic resonance imaging using a 32-bit microcontroller.
abstract: A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) pulse programmer has been developed using a single-chip microcontroller (ADmicroC7026). The microcontroller includes all the components required for the MRI pulse programmer: a 32-bit RISC CPU core, 62 kbytes of flash memory, 8 kbytes of SRAM, two 32-bit timers, four 12-bit DA converters, and 40 bits of general purpose I/O. An evaluation board for the microcontroller was connected to a host personal computer (PC), an MRI transceiver, and a gradient driver using interface circuitry. Target (embedded) and host PC programs were developed to enable MRI pulse sequence generation by the microcontroller. The pulse programmer achieved a (nominal) time resolution of approximately 100 ns and a minimum time delay between successive events of approximately 9 micros. Imaging experiments using the pulse programmer demonstrated the effectiveness of our approach.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Applied Physics, University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.
authors.forename: Shinya
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Handa
authors.forename: Thierry
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Domalain
authors.forename: Katsumi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kose
mesh_terms: D003195:Computer Communication Networks / Q000295:instrumentation*; D017076:Computer-Aided Design; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D007089:Image Enhancement / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D008838:Microcomputers; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted / Q000295:instrumentation*