A study on reconstruction of electric properties in magnetic resonance electric properties tomography (MREPT)

Abstract

Magnetic resonance electric properties tomography (MREPT) is a method to reconstruct electric properties (electric conductivity $\sigma$ and permittivity $\varepsilon$) inside the human body using an MRI scanner. In MREPT, we inject a current at the Larmor frequency through a birdcage-type coil and measure the induced magnetic flux density $\mathbf{H}$ using the MRI scanner. Then we can get the electric properties by solving time-harmonic Maxwell`s equations with the measured $\mathbf{H}$. Since the method does not need to inject current directly into the human body, it can use high-frequency current and be safer than other methods. Consequentially, it will be more useful in medical fields than other methods in the electric impedance tomography (EIT).