Xiaojun Xu1, Martin H. Deppe1, Nicola De Zanche2, Jim M. Wild1
1Academic Radiology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, United Kingdom; 2Department of Medical Physics, Cross Cancer Institute and University of Alberta, Canada
A whole body asymmetric birdcage transmit receive coil is demonstrated for hyperpolarised 129Xe MR lung imaging. The objective was to develop an insert body transmit-receive birdcage RF coil for imaging of hyperpolarised 129Xe in the lungs at 17.7 MHz at 1.5 T. The design makes efficient use of the available bore space within a clinical MR system, has homogenous B1 field and is transparent to the 1H body coil making anatomical 1H imaging of the chest possible without moving the coil. In future work, the coil will be used as a transmit-only coil in conjunction with a custom receive array.
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