title: Design and implementation of a simple multinuclear MRI system for ultra high-field imaging of animals.
abstract: Non-proton MRI has recently garnered gathering interest with the increased availability of ultra high-field MRI system. Assuming the availability of a broadband RF amplifier, performing multinuclear MR experiments essentially requires additional hardware, such as an RF resonator and a T/R switch for each nucleus. A double- or triple-resonant RF probe is typically constructed using traps or PIN-diode circuits, but this approach degrades the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and image quality compared to a single-resonant coil and this is a limiting factor. In this work, we have designed the required hardware for multinuclear MR imaging experiments employing six single-resonant coil sets and a purpose-built animal bed; these have been implemented into a home-integrated 9.4T preclinical MRI scanner. System capabilities are demonstrated by distinguishing concentration differences and sensitivity of X-nuclei imaging and spectroscopy without SNR penalty for any nuclei, no subject interruption and no degradation of the static shim conditions.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany. Electronic address: c.choi@fz-juelich.de.
authors.forename: Chang-Hoon
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Choi
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany.
authors.forename: YongHyun
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ha
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany.
authors.forename: Pandichelvam
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Veeraiah
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany.
authors.forename: Jörg
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Felder
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany.
authors.forename: Klaus
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Möllenhoff
authors.affiliation: Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine - 4, Forschungszentrum Juelich, 52425 Juelich, Germany; Faculty of Medicine, Department of Neurology, RWTH Aachen University, JARA, Aachen, Germany; Department of Electrical and Computer Systems Engineering, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia; Monash Biomedical Imaging, School of Psychological Sciences, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: N Jon
authors.initials: NJ
authors.lastname: Shah
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004867:Equipment Design; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D059629:Signal-To-Noise Ratio
keywords: Hardware; Multinuclear; Phantom; Preclinical; RF coil; Ultra high field; X-nuclei