Design and manufacture of an ultra-high field ex vivo coil assembly

Abstract

Magnetic Resonance based architectonic segmentation aims to detect variations in brain architecture that may provide incredible insight into diseases such as epilepsy, schizophrenia, dyslexia, and autism. Data from ex vivo scans is necessary for the development of automatic methods to detect these critical variations in vivo (1) (2). The optimization of ex vivo imaging requires the design and construction of special purpose instrumentation. This thesis presents the mechanical design and construction of a 32 channel ex vivo coil assembly for use in a 7 tesla MRI. The unit will be used for research at the Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging in Charlestown, Massachusetts. Also presented is the development and implementation of two unique low-cost tools to enhance the medical instrument prototyping process: a desktop vacuum casting system, and an automatic tool-path generation program for machining directly from STL files. Finally, an improved method and apparatus for degassing the tissue samples is developed and implemented leading to improvements in MRI image quality.