Abstract #0520

Toward Densely Populated Dipole Arrays for Human Prostate Imaging at 7T: 8Tx16Rx Coaxial-End Dipole Array

Georgiy Alekseevich Solomakha¹, Markus May^2,3, Oliver Kraff², Klaus Scheffler^1,4, Harald Quick^2,3, and Nikolai Ivanovich Avdievich ¹

¹High-Field MR Center, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany, ²Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic Resonance Imaging, University Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany, ³High-Field and Hybrid MR Imaging, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany, ⁴Department for Biomedical Magnetic Resonance, University of Tübingen, Tuebingen, Germany

Synopsis

Keywords: RF Arrays & Systems, Body, Dipoles, Arrays, RF-shimming, SNR, SAR

Motivation: To improve SNR and the SAR-performance in prostate imaging at 7T using a densely populated coaxial-end dipole array.

Goal(s): To numerically optimize and evaluate an 8Tx/16Rx coaxial-end dipole array for prostate imaging at 7T.

Approach: Geometry of a coaxial-end element was optimized to minimize peak SAR and improve coverage. In transmission, 16 coaxial-end dipoles were combined into 8 pairs. This further reduced pSAR. 8-element fractionated dipole and stripline arrays were simulated for comparison.

Results: Optimized 8Tx/16Rx coaxial-end dipole array improved SNR in prostate compared to all other 8-element arrays. SAR-performance of the developed array was better than that of other dipole arrays.

Impact: We demonstrated that densely populated 16-element coaxial-end dipole array improved SNR in the prostate by at least 10% compared to 8-element arrays. In addition, combining 16 elements in 8 pairs during transmission improved SAR-performance in comparison to the 8-channel array.

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