Experimental Verification of Enhanced B1 Shim Performance with a Z-Encoding RF Coil Array at 7 Tesla.

Gregor Adriany¹, Johannes Ritter¹, Tommy Vaughan¹, Kamil Ugurbil¹, Pierre-Francois Van de Moortele¹

Efficient and homogeneous spin excitation in areas of the lower temporal lobe and the cerebellum is difficult to achieve at 7 tesla and above. We experimentally evaluated the performance of a 7 tesla transceiver head array with z encoding capability and compared this coil to a similar sized coil without the additional coil elements along the z direction. Capability to RF shim the whole head is demonstrated.