Catalina S. Arteaga de Castro1, Ozlem Ipek1, Mariska P. Luttje1, Marco van Vulpen1, Juus Noteboom1, Peter R. Luijten1, Uulke A. van der Heide2, Dennis W.J. Klomp1
1University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, Netherlands; 2Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Prostate imaging at higher magnetic fields like 7 Tesla is challenging. Even after B1 shimming the B1 strength at the prostate location remains low. Endorectal coils are used to increase the receive sensitivity at the prostate, but as transmitters they can substantially increase the B1. In contrast from receive only coils that need PIN diodes to be decoupled from the transmitters, the ERC remains tuned when combined with external coils. We use active decoupling as an alternative to PIN diode decoupling by transmitting with the ERC with an optimized amplitude and phase to counteract the coupling caused by the field of the external elements.