Open birdcage coil for head imaging at 7T.

PURPOSE: To theoretically describe, design, and test the new geometry of the birdcage coil for 7 Tesla anatomical brain imaging, which includes a large window on top, without deliberately jeopardizing its homogeneity and efficiency. This opencage will not only improve patient comfort but also enable the volunteer to follow functional MRI stimuli. This design could also facilitate the tracking of patient compliance and enable better correction of the movement. METHODS: Via the transfer matrix approach, a birdcage-like coil with a nonperiodic distribution of rungs is constructed with optimized currents in the coil rungs. Subsequently, the coil is adjusted in full-wave simulations. Then, the coil is assembled, fine-tuned, and matched on the bench. Finally, these results are confirmed experimentally on a phantom and in vivo. RESULTS: Indeed, the computed isolation of -14.9 dB between the feeding ports of the coil and the symmetry of the circular polarized mode pattern transmit RF magnetic field ( B1+ ) showed that the coil was properly optimized. An experimental assessment of the developed coil showed competitive transmit efficiency and coverage compared with the conventional birdcage coil of similar size. CONCLUSION: The proposed opencage coil can be designed and work without a dramatic drop of performance in terms of the B1+ field homogeneity, transmit efficiency ( B1+ / Pref ), peak local specific absorption rate ( SAR10g ) and SAR efficiency ( B1+ / SAR10g ).

Enhancing surface coil sensitive volume with hybridized electric dipoles at 17.2 T.

Preclinical MR applications at 17.2 T can require field of views on the order of a few square centimeters. This is a challenging task as the proton Larmor frequency reaches 730 MHz. Most of the protocols at such frequencies are performed with surface transceiver coils for which the sensitive volume and the signal to noise ratio (SNR) is given by their size. Here we propose an approach based on metamaterials in order to enhance the sensitive volume of a commercial surface coil for small animal imaging at 17.2 T. We designed a passive resonator composed of four hybridized electric dipoles placed onto the floor of the MRI bed. Combining numerical and experimental results on a phantom and in vivo, we demonstrate a 20% increase of the sensitive volume in depth and 25% along the rostro-caudal axis while maintaining more than 85% of the local SNR right beneath the surface coil plane. Moreover, our solution gives the ability to double the average SNR in the region between 1.2 and 2 cm away from the loop using a single layer of 1 mm thick metallic wires easy to design and manufacture.

Light scattering by periodic rough surfaces: equivalent jump conditions.

We present an interface model based on two-scale homogenization to predict the coherent scattering of light by a periodic rough interface between air and a dielectric. Contrary to previous approaches where the roughnesses are replaced by a layer filled with an equivalent medium, our modeling yields effective jump conditions applying across the region containing the roughnesses. The validity of the model is inspected by comparison with direct numerics and with experimental measurements on an air/silicium rough interface near the Brewster angle. It is shown that the interface model reproduces accurately the shift in the Brewster phenomenon without any adjustable parameter, which is of practical importance in retrieval methods to get thickness or filling fraction with reliable physical values.

Extraordinary transmission through subwavelength dielectric gratings in the microwave range.

We address the problem of the transmission through subwavelength dielectric gratings. Following Maurel et al. [Phys. Rev. B 88, 115416 (2013)], the problem is reduced to the transmission by an homogeneous slab, either anisotropic (for transverse magnetic waves, TM) or isotropic (for transverse electric waves, TE), and an explicit expression of the transmission coefficient is derived. The optimum angle realizing perfect impedance matching (Brewster angle) is shown to depend on the contrasts of the dielectric layers with respect to the air. Besides, we show that the Fabry-Perot resonances may be dependent on the incident angle, in addition to the dependence on the frequency. These facts depart from the case of metallic gratings usually considered; they are confirmed experimentally both for TE and TM waves in the microwave regime.

Tunneling of electromagnetic energy in multiple connected leads using ε-near-zero materials.

A realization of a reflectionless power splitter is proposed by use of a metamaterial junction. To design the junction, the electromagnetic wave transmission in multiple connected leads is investigated theoretically and numerically. A closed analytical form is derived for the scattering matrix of any geometry of the interconnected leads. We show that the use of a junction made of ϵ-near-zero (ENZ) material allows production of perfect transmission. This can be achieved by reducing the area of the ENZ junction (squeezing effect) and by tuning the widths of the output leads with respect to the input lead. It is also shown that the same effect is obtained without squeezed junction by using a match impedance zero index material (MIZIM junction).

Planar metamaterial based on hybridization for directive emission.

We present the first experimental demonstration of a high-directivity using a mu and epsilon near zero (MENZ) metamaterial. We use the hybridization principles to design a planar MENZ structure based on the fishnet unit cell. Resonant mode engineering achieves an effective permittivity and permeability that approaches zeros around 10.5 GHz simultaneously. We use this metamaterial as a superstrate of a microstrip patch antenna. We show that the directivity of the antenna is effectively enhanced compared to that of the patch antenna alone at the desired frequency.

Double-T metamaterial for parallel and normal transverse electric incident waves.

Electric and magnetic hybridized plasmonic modes are obtained by stacking two T-shaped resonators. We show that head-to-toe configuration leads to inverse the hybridization. The frequency shift between the resonances is finely controlled by adjusting the gap between the two resonators. A negative refractive index close to -1 is numerically and experimentally demonstrated at 4.3 GHz for TE waves. This left-handed behavior is similar for parallel and normal TE incident wave vectors. The proposed double-T unit cell is well adapted for developing terahertz and IR metamaterials.

Discontinuous wavelength super-refraction in photonic crystal superprism.

Experimental results on wavelength-dependent angular dispersion in InGaAsP triangular lattice planar photonic crystals are presented. An abrupt variation of the angular dispersion is observed for TM-polarized waves whose frequencies are comprised between those of the fourth and sixth allowed bands. According to the crystal period, the measured angle of refraction is found to either decrease or increase by 30 degrees within a wavelength range smaller than 30 nm. Experimental results are reproduced well from 2D finite difference time domain calculations. The observed phenomena are interpreted from the coupling of the incident light to different modes of the photonic crystal that travel with different group velocities and propagate in different directions within the crystal. Mode dispersion curves and mode patterns are calculated along with isofrequency curves to support this explanation. The observed discontinuous wavelength super-refraction opens a new approach to the application of superprisms.