RESPIRATORY TRIGGERED IMAGING WITH AN OPTICAL DISPLACEMENT SENSOR

Motion of abdominal organs with respiration is a major problem in NMR spectroscopy and imaging thereof. Triggering each Phase-encoding step with respiration or gating a number of phase-encoding steps is one approach to the problem. The design of a sensor for small animal experiments has not been as simple. An optical device, implemented with polymer optical fibres is described, along with associated hardware and electronics which can act as a trigger for small animal NMR experiments. A brief description of a similar device for human application is also given. 2DFT spin-echo and B0 susceptibility images, both triggered and untriggered, are presented to validate the technique.