William Dominguez Viqueira1,2, Warren Berger1, Juan Parra-Robles3, Giles E. Santyr1,2
1Imaging Laboratories, Robarts Research Institute, London, Ontario, Canada; 2Medical Biophysics, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada; 3Academic Unit Of Radiology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK
SNR at low magnetic field strength can be improved by reducing RF coil noise using Litz wire coils. In this work we compare coils built with four different wires types, conventional copper wire vs. three different Litz wire types for low field hyperpolarized noble gas imaging of rat lungs. The comparison was conducted at 866 kHz and 2.385 MHz corresponding to Larmor frequencies of 129Xe and 3He at 73.5 mT. The quality factors and the signal to noise ratio (SNR) for each coil at each frequency were measured. Results demonstrate the advantages of Litz wire over conventional copper wire at these frequencies.