7T body imaging

Challenges and Opportunities

While most clinical human MRI scanners operate at a field strength of 1.5 T or 3 T, the number of MRI systems operating at ultrahigh field (UHF) of 7 T and beyond rises. A main reason for increasing B0 is given by the supralinear increase of the signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR), which can be invested to increase the spatial or temporal resolution or to shorten scan times. In addition, in many MR applications the contrast is stronger due to altered relaxation times at UHF, due to stronger chemical shift and further effects. Despite the advantages of 7 T, however, the clinical transition from 3T to 7 T for body applications has been much slower as compared to brain applications. This can be mostly attributed to the challenges that arise when imaging the body at 7T and beyond.

The talk will focus on such challenges and demonstrate technical solutions that mostly rely on parallel transmission and B1 shimming techniques. Aside from investigating such methods, a main goal of these developments is to achieve a streamlined and robust clinical workflow for future 7 T body MRI.

Several applications of 7T body MRI including flow imaging, fat/water imaging, and cardiac MRI will be shown.

The lecture will be held as a zoom meeting, please connect using:

https://unibe-ch.zoom.us/meeting/register/u50qfuCorTgqGdQ3svLKfbDxi9ctHakr94LQ

For further info please contact: karin.zwygart@insel.ch