Abstract: High-field clinical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) system often requires multiple-channel (i.e., 16 or 32) receivers that are capable of transmitting data at a high speed, especially during fast imaging. In this work, a data transmission module based on PowerPC processor is developed and integrated in a custom-built MRI spectrometer for high-speed data transmission between the spectrometer and the host computer. The module uses the Freescale's high-performance PowerPC processor MPC8270 as its core, and runs on the embedded Linux operating system. The processor and the computer are connected through a 100 M Ethernet network, while the sequence running the data acquisition modules (quantity scalability) is connected to the processor using a local bus. Responding to the interruption requests from the data acquisition module, the processor reads and uploads the data quickly. The speed and reliability of the response are guaranteed through the design of the driver program. The results of imaging experiments demonstrate that the design proposed can meet the high-speed data transmission requirements of multiple receiving channels.

Key words: magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), console, data transmission, PowerPC