MRI Compatible Ultrasound Transducers for Simultaneous Acquisition of Coregistered Ultrasound to MRI Data

Abstract Magnetic resonance imaging has become an important part of radiological diagnostics as it shows high resolution volumes of human tissue without any radiation exposure. Beside the high costs for MR imaging the greatest disadvantage of this technology is that it is not real-time capable which leads to possible motion artifacts. Whereas Ultrasound is the most common diagnostic tool in radiology as it is real-time capable and cost effective. Therefore a combination of both modalities is obvious, not only to reduce motion artifacts in MR imaging but to save costs by reducing time in the MR scanner through coregistering ultrasound and MR images for deformation analysis. This work presents the manufacturing and measurement results of MR compatible ultrasound transducers for motion compensation and deformation analyses for clinical interventions under MRI conditions, based on ultrasound volumes acquired by a full MR compatible 180° rotating 8 MHz phased array.