Abstract #2941

Large Field-Of-View in Vivo Imaging Using Traveling Waves on a Whole Body 7 Tesla Scanner

Nadine Smith¹, Kristina Haines², Maarten Versluis¹, Andrew Webb¹

¹Radiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands; ²Electrical Engineering, Penn State University, University Park, PA, USA

Human brain images have been obtained using excitation from a tuned patch antenna placed ~50 cm away from the subject in a whole body 7 tesla scanner. Dielectric loading of the magnet bore by the subject reduces the cutoff frequency below the Larmor frequency, allowing a traveling wave to propagate along the bore. Large field-of-view images have been obtained of the head, neck and shoulders. Although transmission is relatively low efficiency, a localized phased array can be used as the receiver coil for sensitive detection and parallel imaging.