Magnetic resonance coil prototyping and implementation for multi-nuclear small animal imaging

Area of Science:

• Medical Imaging
• Materials Science
• Electrical Engineering

Background:

• Heteronuclear MR imaging offers unique insights into disease states.
• Custom radiofrequency (RF) coil designs are crucial but challenging to develop.
• Rapid prototyping is needed for specialized MR coil fabrication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To address challenges in rapidly prototyping heteronuclear MR coils for small animal imaging.
• To propose a novel method using 3D-printing for inductor shaping.
• To enhance coil reproducibility and utility through a new pipeline.

Main Methods:

• Developed a rapid prototyping pipeline for affordable and sensitive MR coils.
• Compared reproducibility of 3D-printed mold inductors against hand-turned and PCB inductors.
• Validated a theoretical model for PCB/inductor coupling effects on tuning and matching.

Main Results:

• 3D-printed mold inductors showed higher reproducibility than hand-turned ones.
• PCB RF coils exhibited the highest reproducibility.
• The developed model accurately predicts resonance characteristics within 1% of measured values.

Conclusions:

• The prototyping pipeline enables rapid design of highly reproducible MR coils.
• Coils can be easily adapted for various experimental setups.
• Design resources are publicly available for broader use.