Using a multiple RF coil to widen FOV and improve sensitivity of head-neck MRI

A multiple RF coil consisting of a head QD coil and a neck solenoid coil is developed for a vertical magnetic field MRI system, and its feasibility is demonstrated. The field-of-view (FOV) and sensitivity of the multiple RF coil under object-loaded conditions are calculated. The results show that the multiple RF coil has 1.7 times wider FOV and almost 10% higher sensitivity than a conventional head QD coil. A 0.3-T head-neck multiple RF coil is fabricated and imaging experiments are performed. Combination of the two RF receiving coils' signals leads to a wide FOV for both phantom images and human head-neck images. A dip in the sensitivity profile of the sagittal images relating to the setting position of the RF receiving coil is corrected by using shading correction. Thus, head-neck sagittal images having wider FOV and higher sensitivity are obtained from vertical magnetic field MRI. (author)