Patent ID: 8067940

Claim:
A method for processing radio frequency (RF) signals of a tubular surface coil, wherein said tubular surface coil comprises M coil units, M being an even number greater than 1, and said M coil units are divided into M/2 pairs, with two coil units in each of the pairs being disposed at symmetrical positions in said tubular surface coil, said method comprising: generating N channels of coil output signals based on M channels of radio frequency signals, acquired by said M coil units, wherein N is an even number which is greater than 1 and less than or equal to M, and said N channels of coil output signals are divided into N/2 pairs, with the two channels of coil output signals in each of the pairs respectively coming from the coil units at symmetrical positions in said tubular surface coil; multiplying respectively the modulus values of the two channels of coil output signals in said each pair of coil output signals to obtain N/2 products which are then summed, and computing the square root of said summed result, with said computed result of square root being used to generate a lateral cross-sectional image.