A NOVEL-APPROACH TO THE CALCULATION OF RF MAGNETIC AND ELECTRIC-FIELDS FOR NMR COILS OF ARBITRARY GEOMETRY

This paper presents a novel approach for determining the magnetic and electric fields generated by NMR RF coils of arbitrary shape, Maxwell' s equations are solved using Helmholtz retarded potentials, The model incorporates the effects of radiofrequencies and allows the calculatio n of both electric and magnetic fields at any position, Discussion of the numerical evaluation of the resulting formulas is presented, A com parison of the numerical results with an exact solution is made for th e case of a singular circular loop of wire, Theoretical results for a birdcage coil are also given. This approach provides fast, accurate re sults and will easily lend itself to coil optimization. (C) 1995 Acade mic Press, Inc.