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Dr Julia Hu
No more applications being accepted
Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)
About the Project
A 3.5 year fully funded PhD Studentship in Electronic Engineering (RF/Microwave Engineering) is available at Lancaster University Engineering Department, a top 10 UK University, in collaboration with Nottingham University, University of Queensland, and an industrial partner: Pulseteq Ltd.
Recently, US President Barack Obama unveiled a $100 million investment plan to fund a brain-mapping study from 2014, hoping that brain research through innovative neurotechnologies will eventually yield methods of treating, preventing and curing many brain disorders such as Alzheimer’s, autism and traumatic brain injury. Ultrahigh field Magnetic Resonance Imaging scanners (MRI), such as 7 Tesla MRI, will become a valuable and important tool to map the whole-neural-circuit activity with functional MRI technology. To ensure what an MRI measures is an accurate reflection of what we want to know about how the brain works, it becomes of paramount importance to develop advanced technology to solve the current technical challenges presented at 7T: various image artifacts due to the increased inhomogeneity of the magnetic excitation (B_1^+) field, such as central brightening and local hot spots and little excitation in certain regions.
The latest technology to solve the above-mentioned problems is to utilise the novel Radio Frequency (RF) Engineering technology, dynamic parallel transmission (pTX). However the difficulty in accurately characterising the patient specific RF power deposition in a clinical-allowable time scale greatly hampers the development of suitable RF Pulse sequence and associated body coil to advance the pTX technology for in-vivo MRI imaging at ultrahigh field.
Project Objectives:
1. To develop the numerical software for the ultrafast and individualized SAR calculation
2. To verify the SAR calculation method by experiments
3. To use the patient-specific local SAR value obtained from the new method as a local legalization in the design of high-performance pTX RF pulse
4. To develop GPU parallel computing to accelerate the time-consuming SAR-constraint RF pulse optimisation process
5. To optimise the RF body coil performance while minimising its RF power deposition
This could potentially be a commercial RF hardware product by collaborating with the project industrial partner, with great potentials for industry applications.
For this multi-disciplinary project, a passion to learn magnetic resonance physics and computational electromagnetic guided RF design techniques is very important.
Recently, US President Barack Obama unveiled a $100 million investment plan to fund a brain-mapping study from 2014, hoping that brain research through innovative neurotechnologies will eventually yield methods of treating, preventing and curing many brain disorders such as Alzheimer’s, autism and traumatic brain injury. Ultrahigh field Magnetic Resonance Imaging scanners (MRI), such as 7 Tesla MRI, will become a valuable and important tool to map the whole-neural-circuit activity with functional MRI technology. To ensure what an MRI measures is an accurate reflection of what we want to know about how the brain works, it becomes of paramount importance to develop advanced technology to solve the current technical challenges presented at 7T: various image artifacts due to the increased inhomogeneity of the magnetic excitation (B_1^+) field, such as central brightening and local hot spots and little excitation in certain regions.
The latest technology to solve the above-mentioned problems is to utilise the novel Radio Frequency (RF) Engineering technology, dynamic parallel transmission (pTX). However the difficulty in accurately characterising the patient specific RF power deposition in a clinical-allowable time scale greatly hampers the development of suitable RF Pulse sequence and associated body coil to advance the pTX technology for in-vivo MRI imaging at ultrahigh field.
Project Objectives:
1. To develop the numerical software for the ultrafast and individualized SAR calculation
2. To verify the SAR calculation method by experiments
3. To use the patient-specific local SAR value obtained from the new method as a local legalization in the design of high-performance pTX RF pulse
4. To develop GPU parallel computing to accelerate the time-consuming SAR-constraint RF pulse optimisation process
5. To optimise the RF body coil performance while minimising its RF power deposition
This could potentially be a commercial RF hardware product by collaborating with the project industrial partner, with great potentials for industry applications.
For this multi-disciplinary project, a passion to learn magnetic resonance physics and computational electromagnetic guided RF design techniques is very important.
Funding Notes
The studentship provides a tuition fee waiver at the UK/EU rate and is thus suitable for UK or European students. Overseas students may also apply when the difference between Home and Overseas fees can be met by other means.
Applicant Requirements:
1. The applicant should possess a good honours degree (1st Class or Upper Second) or a distinction or high merit at MSc level (or international equivalent) in Electronic Engineering, Physics or Computer Science.
2. Applicant will also need to provide evidence of competence in English language if English is not the applicant’s first language.
Applicant Requirements:
1. The applicant should possess a good honours degree (1st Class or Upper Second) or a distinction or high merit at MSc level (or international equivalent) in Electronic Engineering, Physics or Computer Science.
2. Applicant will also need to provide evidence of competence in English language if English is not the applicant’s first language.
References
Application Procedure:
Applicants should first send a covering letter and CV to b.hu1@lancaster.ac.uk, and then apply online at http://www.postgraduate.lancs.ac.uk. Please name Dr. Bobo Hu as the proposed supervisor. Interviews will be conducted at a suitable time.
Applicants should first send a covering letter and CV to b.hu1@lancaster.ac.uk, and then apply online at http://www.postgraduate.lancs.ac.uk. Please name Dr. Bobo Hu as the proposed supervisor. Interviews will be conducted at a suitable time.
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