Active Detuning of MRI Receive Coils with GaN FETs

Author

Twieg, Michael ; de Rooij, Michael A. ; Griswold, Mark A.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH, USA

Volume

63

Issue

12

fYear

2015

Firstpage

4169

Lastpage

4177

Abstract

Here, we present the use of Gallium Nitride (GaN) FETs as a replacement for PIN diodes in active detuning circuits for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) receive coils at 63.6 MHz. We use simulated circuit models, benchtop measurements, and imaging experiments to show that GaN FETs perform comparably with a common MRI-compatible PIN diode. The GaN FET-based circuits require orders of magnitude less bias current to operate, effectively eliminating B0 distortion resulting from biasing.

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; active networks; circuit simulation; circuit tuning; coils; field effect transistors; gallium compounds; magnetic resonance imaging; p-i-n diodes; wide band gap semiconductors; FET; GaN; MRI receive coil; PIN diode; active detuning circuit; benchtop measurement; bias current; field effect transistor; frequency 63.6 MHz; gallium nitride; imaging experiment; magnetic resonance imaging; simulated circuit model; Coils; Field effect transistors; Gallium nitride; Integrated circuit modeling; Magnetic resonance imaging; PIN photodiodes; Radio frequency; Detuning; GaN; MRI; PIN diode; RF coil; eGaN FET;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Microwave Theory and Techniques, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9480

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TMTT.2015.2495366

Filename

7328341