Sensing motion in MRI using RF intermodulation
AssigneeThe Regents of the University of California
InventorsShimon M. Lustig, Suma Mandayam Anand, Alan Dong
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Abstract
A method of sensing motion in an MRI scanner includes transmitting at least two tones having different frequencies, using intermodulation to combine the two tones, transmitting the two tones as a combined signal during an MRI scan of a patient, receiving the combined signal using a receiver in the MRI scanner, demodulating the combined signal to produce a demodulated signal, and analyzing the demodulated signal to detect motion of the patient during the MRI scan.
Claims17
A method of sensing motion in an MRI scanner, comprising:
- transmitting at least two tones having different frequencies;
- mixing the at least two tones using intermodulation to combine the two tones into a combined signal within MRI receiver bandwidth;
- transmitting the two tones as the combined signal during an MRI scan of a patient;
- receiving the combined signal using a selected receiver coil from one or more existing receiver coils in the MRI scanner;
- demodulating the combined signal to produce a demodulated signal;
- and
- analyzing the demodulated signal to detect motion of the patient being scanned during the MRI scan.
A motion sensing system for a MRI scanner, comprising:
- one or more transmitters to generate at least two different frequency tones;
- a mixer to mix the at least two different frequency tones using intermodulation to produce a mixed signal having a frequency within a frequency of a receiver of the MRI scanner;
- one or more antennas to transmit the mixed signal into a bore of the MRI scanner occupied by a patient;
- a receiver in the MRI scanner to receive the mixed signal;
- and
- one or more processors to execute code to analyze the mixed signal to determine patient motion.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.