Magnetic resonance (MR) system with increased wireless channel throughput and method of operation thereof

A method of operating a magnetic resonance (MR) system, the method controlled by at least one controller (104, 304, 610), the method comprising:

• receiving induced MR signals from at least one wireless radio-frequency (RF) coil comprising antenna loops and an antenna array comprising transmission (WTx) and reception (WRx) antennas;
• communicating between the at least one wireless RF coil and a base transmitter system (BTS) having an antenna array (ANT)(i)) comprising a plurality of transmission (BTx) and reception (BRx) antennas using a selected spatial diversity (SD) transmission method;
• determining a number of at least one of the transmission and reception antennas available for communication between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil, coupling the plurality of transmission (BTx) and reception (BRx) antennas of the BTS to the transmission (WTx) and reception (WRx) antennas of the at least one wireless RF coil to form corresponding antenna pairings;
• determining signal characteristic information (SCI) of each of the antenna pairings;
• selecting an SD transmission method for communicating with the at least one wireless RF coil based upon the determined number of transmission and reception antennas and the determined SCI to enable communication of a given type of information between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil;
• establishing at least one communication channel between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil in accordance with the selected SD transmission method;
• and
• transmitting the received MR signals between the at least one RF coil and the BTS on the at least one established communication channel.

A computer program stored on a computer readable non-transitory memory medium (110, 620) for a magnetic resonance (MR) system, the computer program comprising computer program instructions that when executed by a processor (104, 304, 610) cause the processor to perform a method comprising:

• receiving induced MR signals from at least one wireless radio-frequency (RF) coil (125-x, 325-x, 660) comprising antenna loops (352) and an antenna array comprising transmission (WTx) and reception (WRx) antennas;
• communicating between the at least one wireless RF coil and a base transmitter system (BTS) having an antenna array comprising a plurality of transmission (BTx) and reception (BRx) antennas using a selected spatial diversity (SD) transmission method;
• determining a number of at least one of the transmission and reception antennas available for communication between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil;
• coupling the plurality of transmission (BTx) and reception (BRx) antennas of the BTS to the transmission (WTx) and reception (WRx) antennas of the at least one wireless RF coil to form corresponding antenna pairings;
• determining signal characteristic information (SCI) of each of the antenna pairings;
• selecting an SD transmission method for communicating with the at least one wireless RF coil based upon the determined number of transmission and reception antennas and the determined SCI to enable communication of a given type of information between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil;
• establishing at least one communication channel between the BTS and the at least one wireless RF coil in accordance with the selected SD transmission method;
• and
• transmitting the received MR signals between the at least one RF coil and the BTS on the at least one established communication channel.