Stephan Orzada1,2, Stefan Maderwald1,2,
Oliver Kraff1,2, Irina Brote1,2, Mark E. Ladd1,2,
Klaus Solbach3, Pedram Yazdanbakhsh3, Achim Bahr4,
Hans-Peter Fautz5, Andreas K. Bitz1,2
1Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic
Resonance Imaging, Essen, NRW, Germany; 2Department of Diagnostic
and Interventional Radiology and Neuroradiology, University Hospital Essen,
Essen, NRW, Germany; 3High Frequency Engineering, University
Duisburg-Essen, Duisburg, NRW, Germany; 4IMST GmbH, Kamp-Lintfort,
Germany; 5Siemens Healthcare Sector, Erlangen, Germany
To
increase the capability of a 7 Tesla 8-channel RF shimming system, a
16-channel Tx/Rx body coil was built to be used with a 16-channel Butler
matrix for mode compression and an 8-channel variable power combiner. The
array has a large field of view and shows good homogeneity in gradient echo
images. RF shimming with mode compression and variable power combining was
successfully performed in human volunteers.