Coils for Human Whole Body Imaging at 7T

DESCRIPTION provided by applicant For this Phase II STTR proposal the investigators plan to develop and commercialize the radiofrequency RF coil technology to make T body MRI possible and to translate this new technology to vastly improve T clinical MRI as well In the Phase I project leading to this proposal all specific aims were accomplished to demonstrate the feasibility of safely and successfully imaging the human body for the first time with commercially available technology at T This technology incorporated a number of innovations including automatic tuning and matching and multi channel transmit RF field shimming Unlike the whole body coil built into the bore of clinical magnets the RF coil technology developed here is easily retrofitted to existing systems atop the patient table and fitting closely to the bdy for improved efficiency The Phase II project proposed will deliver an improved commercial package of this device with the built in multi channel dedicated power amplifiers required to drive it Because this technology offers advantages of multi channel RF field control optimization and efficiency it would bring new advantages to T clinical imaging as well Accordingly a T clinical body coil system will be developed for commercial offering as well PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE We plan to provide for the first time a commercial radiofrequency RF body coil system for human MRI at Tesla along with an improved body coil system for Tesla clinical imaging These body coils will combine multi channel RF field optimization capability together with automatic tuning and matching and significant transmit efficiency gains through conformal fit and on coil channel dedicated power amplifiers This new RF technology will make T body imaging possible and T body imaging substantially improved