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Medical imaging

MRI rides the wave

Nature volume 457, pages 971–972 (2009)Cite this article

An innovative approach for exciting and detecting signals in magnetic resonance imaging not only improves image quality but also enables radical changes in scanner design by freeing up space around the patient.

Magnetic fields varying at radio frequency (RF) are fundamental to nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and the related technique of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). In NMR, RF fields are used in conjunction with a strong, constant magnetic field to excite hydrogen nuclei in water into precession. The precessing nuclei in turn generate an RF magnetic-field oscillation — the NMR signal. In almost all MRI experiments, the RF field is generated by a coil of wire — the RF coil1 — and the nuclear precession is detected by electromagnetic induction in a similar coil. But excitation and detection of the NMR signal require that the RF coils lie in close proximity to the human body because it is the short-range signals (the near fields) that are exploited in the interaction.

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Figure 1: Travelling-wave MRI.

D. BRUNNER & K. PRUESSMANN

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Paul Glover and Richard Bowtell are in the Sir Peter Mansfield Magnetic Resonance Centre, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK. richard.bowtell@nottingham.ac.uk ,

    Paul Glover & Richard Bowtell

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  1. Paul Glover
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  2. Richard Bowtell
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Glover, P., Bowtell, R. MRI rides the wave. Nature 457, 971–972 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/457971a

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