Head-and-neck multichannel B1⁺ mapping and RF shimming of the carotid arteries using a 7T parallel-transmit head coil

Purpose: Neurovascular MRI suffers from a rapid drop in B₁ ⁺ into the neck when using transmit head coils at 7 T. One solution to improving B₁ ⁺ magnitude in the major feeding arteries in the neck is to use custom RF shims on parallel-transmit head coils. However, calculating such shims requires robust multichannel B₁ ⁺ maps in both the head and the neck, which is challenging due to low RF penetration into the neck, limited dynamic range of multichannel B₁ ⁺ mapping techniques, and B₀ sensitivity. We therefore sought a robust, large-dynamic-range, parallel-transmit field mapping protocol and tested whether RF shimming can improve carotid artery B₁ ⁺ magnitude in practice.

Methods: A pipeline is presented that combines B₁ ⁺ mapping data acquired using circularly polarized (CP) and CP2-mode RF shims at multiple voltages. The pipeline was evaluated by comparing the predicted and measured B₁ ⁺ for multiple random transmit shims, and by assessing the ability of RF shimming to increase B₁ ⁺ in the carotid arteries.

Results: The proposed method achieved good agreement between predicted and measured B₁ ⁺ in both the head and the neck. The B₁ ⁺ magnitude in the carotid arteries can be increased by 43% using tailored RF shims or by 37% using universal RF shims, while also improving the RF homogeneity compared with CP mode.

Conclusion: B₁ ⁺ in the neck can be increased using RF shims calculated from multichannel B₁ ⁺ maps in both the head and the neck. This can be achieved using universal phase-only RF shims, facilitating easy implementation in existing sequences.