Simultaneous and interleaved acquisition of NMR signals from different nuclei with a clinical MRI scanner

PURPOSE: Modification of a clinical MRI scanner to enable simultaneous or rapid interleaved acquisition of signals from two different nuclei. METHODS: A device was developed to modify the local oscillator signal fed to the receive channel(s) of an MRI console. This enables external modification of the frequency at which the receiver is sensitive and rapid switching between different frequencies. Use of the device was demonstrated with interleaved and simultaneous (31)P and (1)H spectroscopic acquisitions, and with interleaved (31)P and (1)H imaging. RESULTS: Signal amplitudes and signal‐to‐noise ratios were found to be unchanged for the modified system, compared with data acquired with the MRI system in the standard configuration. CONCLUSION: Interleaved and simultaneous (1)H and (31)P signal acquisition was successfully demonstrated with a clinical MRI scanner, with only minor modification of the RF architecture. While demonstrated with (31)P, the modification is applicable to any detectable nucleus without further modification, enabling a wide range of simultaneous and interleaved experiments to be performed within a clinical setting. Magn Reson Med 76:1636–1641, 2016. © 2015 The Authors. Magnetic Resonance in Medicine published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.