Efficiency evaluation of a 13C Magnetic Resonance birdcage coil: Theory and comparison of four methods

Radiofrequency coils in Magnetic Resonance systems are used to produce a homogeneous B-1 field for exciting the nuclei and to pick up the signals emitted by the nuclei with high signal-to-noise ratio. Accordingly, coil performance affects strongly the quality of the obtained data and images. Coil efficiency, defined as the B-1 magnetic field induced at a given point on the square root of supplied power P, is an important parameter that characterizes coil performance, since by maximizing efficiency will also maximize the signal-to-noise ratio. This work describes and compares four methods for coil efficiency estimation, based on different theoretical approaches. Three methods allow efficiency measurement by using "probe techniques'' (perturbing loop, perturbing sphere and pick-up coil), which can be used both on the bench and inside the scanner, while an "NMR technique'' has been employed for comparison purpose. Methods were tested on a C-13 birdcage coil tuned at 32.13 MHz. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.