Volumetric wireless coil for wrist MRI at 1.5 T as a practical alternative to Tx/Rx extremity coil: a comparative study

[Display omitted] •Wireless coil inductively coupled to the body coil can replace the local Tx/Rx coil.•Wireless coil outperforms the Tx/Rx extremity coil’s SNR with up to 1.40-fold gain.•Wireless coil provides 2.5-fold higher global SAR efficiency versus local Tx/Rx coil. This work performs a detailed assessment of radiofrequency (RF) safety and imaging performance of a volumetric wireless coil based on periodically coupled split-loop resonators (SLRs) for 1.5 T wrist MRI versus a commercially available transceive extremity coil. In particular, we evaluated the transmit efficiency and RF safety for three setups: a whole-body birdcage coil, a transceive extremity birdcage coil, and a volumetric wireless coil inductively coupled to the whole-body birdcage coil. The imaging performance of the two latter setups was studied experimentally for nine subjects. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the images acquired with several standard pulse sequences for osteoarthritis wrist imaging was assessed. Application of the wireless coil significantly improved the specific absorption rate (SAR) efficiency of the whole-body birdcage coil, with at least 4.3-fold and 7.6-fold improvement of local and global SAR efficiencies, respectively. This setup also outperformed the transceive extremity coil in terms of SNR (up to 1.40-fold gain) with a moderate (11%) reduction of the local SAR efficiency.