Work

On‐demand field shaping for enhanced magnetic resonance imaging using an ultrathin reconfigurable metasurface

Year: 2021

Type: article

Abstract: The signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR) is the main figure of merit that assesses the quality of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Existing studies mainly focus on improving the magnetic field intensities of the constant homogenous field from the main coil or the oscillating field from the radio frequency (RF) coil. In addition to these options, SNR also depends on the coupling between the imaging subject and the RF coil during the signal reception, which has been largely ignored. Here, we provide a different route toward enhancing the SNR of MRI by improving this coupling during the signal reception. We elucidate a theoretical design of an ultrathin metasurface with micrometer thickness and high flexibility. This metasurface is reconfigurable; it can selectively boost the SNR at a desired imaging region with any arbitrary shapes. Our design has shown that this metasurface can enhance SNR by up to 28 times in the region of interest. At the same time, the metasurface is designed to minimally disturb the excitation fields by less than 1.6%, thus maintaining the uniformity of the excitation, important to achieve a high‐quality MR image without artifacts.

Source: Open Research (University of Surrey)

DOI: 10.1002/viw.20200099

Authors: Hanwei Wang, Hsuan‐Kai Huang, Yun‐Sheng Chen, Yang Zhao

Institution: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Language: English

Topic: Advanced MRI Techniques and Applications

Subfield: Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Imaging

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $4,000

Funder: National Institute of General Medical Sciences