Hoon-Sin Cheong1, Ivo Volkov2, Neil Alford3, Chris Randell4, Jim Wild1, Martyn Paley1
1Academic Radiology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, UK; 2Materials, London South Bank University, London, Middlesex, UK; 3Materials, Imperial College London, London, Middlesex, UK; 4MRI, Pulseteq Limited, Gloucester, Gloucestershire, UK
A 10-turn, 70mm YBCO spiral surface coil was designed for clinical imaging of human extremities at 0.2T. Liquid nitrogen was added to cool the coil to 81K during image acquisitions. The phantom imaging test results show the YBCO coil has SNR advantages of 270% and 80% when compared to an equivalent copper coil at room temperature and 81K respectively. The in-vivo human hand images show good details of the bones and tissue structures. This means the YBCO coil was capable of producing useful anatomical images of human extremity even in a low-field environment.