title: Design and test of a double-nuclear RF coil for (1)H MRI and (13)C MRSI at 7T.
abstract: RF coil operation at the ultrahigh field of 7T is fraught with technical challenges that limit the advancement of novel human in vivo applications at 7T. In this work, a hybrid technique combining a microstrip transmission line and a lumped-element L-C loop coil to form a double-nuclear RF coil for proton magnetic resonance imaging and carbon magnetic resonance spectroscopy at 7T was proposed and investigated. Network analysis revealed a high Q-factor and excellent decoupling between the coils. Proton images and localized carbon spectra were acquired with high sensitivity. The successful testing of this novel double-nuclear coil demonstrates the feasibility of this hybrid design for double-nuclear MR imaging and spectroscopy studies at the ultrahigh field of 7T.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California San Francisco, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Omar
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Rutledge
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California San Francisco, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Tiffany
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kwak
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California San Francisco, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Peng
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cao
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California San Francisco, CA, USA; UCSF - UC Berkeley Joint Graduate Group in Bioengineering, San Francisco & Berkeley, CA, USA; California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), San Francisco, CA, USA. Electronic address: xiaoliang.zhang@ucsf.edu.
authors.forename: Xiaoliang
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D066241:Carbon-13 Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D008280:Magnetics / Q000295:instrumentation*; D057054:Molecular Imaging / Q000295:instrumentation*; D066244:Proton Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy / Q000295:instrumentation*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014159:Transducers
keywords: 7Tesla; Lumped-element L-C loop coil; Microstrip transmission line (MTL) resonator; Radio-frequency (RF) coil; Surface coil; Ultrahigh field magnetic resonance imaging (MRI); Ultrahigh field magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS)