Analog-to-Digital Converters for Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)

An Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC or A/D converter) measures the magnitude of an input analog signal and converts it to a digital number that is proportional to the magnitude of the voltage or current. An ADC often converts signals collected from the real-world to digital signals for processing. One of the more important specifications of an ADC is the resolution that it offers, which is the number of discrete values (represented in bits) that the ADC produces in relation to the analog signal it is converting. The more bits, the higher the resolution. A higher resolution yields a more accurate approximation of the analog input.