Magnetic resonance whole body antenna system, elliptically polarized with major ellipse axis tilted/non-horizontal at least when unoccupied by an examination subject

A method for designing a whole-body antenna configured for a magnetic resonance system having a magnetic resonance scanner with an examination tunnel therein, said method comprising the steps of:

• providing a whole-body antenna with two connection terminals;
• configuring said whole-body antenna to cylindrically extend around said examination tunnel along a longitudinal axis;
• and
• further configuring said whole-body antenna to have an intrinsic transmission characteristic that causes said whole-body antenna, when said two terminals thereof are respectively fed with partial radio-frequency signals that are phase-shifted by 90° relative to each other, to emit a radio-frequency field in said examination tunnel that is elliptically polarized in a plane perpendicular to the longitudinal axis and that has a major ellipse axis that is tilted by a non-zero angle relative to the horizontal, at least when said examination tunnel is empty.

A method for generating a magnetic resonance exposure of an examination subject comprising:

• placing an examination subject in an examination tunnel of a magnetic resonance system;
• cylindrically surrounding the examination subject in the examination tunnel with a whole-body antenna, said whole-body antenna extending along a longitudinal axis of said examination tunnel;
• supplying said whole-body antenna, via two respective supply terminals, with two identical partial radio-frequency signals that are phase-shifted by 90° relative to each other;
• configuring said whole-body antenna to have an intrinsic transmission characteristic that causes said whole-body antenna to irradiate the examination subject in the examination tunnel with a radio-frequency field that is elliptically polarized in a plane perpendicular to the longitudinal axis and that has a major ellipse axis that is tilted by a non\-zero angle relative to the horizontal, at least when the examination subject is not present in the examination tunnel;
• and
• acquiring magnetic resonance signals from the examination subject after irradiating the examination subject with said radio-frequency field, in order to obtain magnetic resonance signals from the examination subject, and
• reconstructing an image of the examination subject from said magnetic resonance signals.