ACCURATE INTENSITY CORRECTION FOR ENDORECTAL SURFACE COIL MR-IMAGING OF THE PROSTATE

An accurate technique has been developed to correct the intensity variation in the MR images acquired with an endorectal surface coil for prostate imaging. The technique relies on reconstructing the in-vivo size, shape and location of the coil during imaging, wherefrom a pixel-by-pixel correction is applied to the coil's sensitivity profile in accordance with the Biot-Savart law. The method has been evaluated by a test-object containing multiple layers of beads embedded in gelatine. Qualitatively, the improvement in visualizing regions of interest after corrections is obvious. Quantitatively, the local snr shows an improvement by a factor of 1.5-2. Several human studies have also been performed, and the technique shows remarkable improvement in visualizing the prostate region.