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Gu C, Li Y, Cao D, Miao X, Paez AG, Sun Y, Cai J, Li W, Li X, Pillai JJ, Earley CJ, van Zijl PC, Hua J. On the optimization of 3D inflow-based vascular-space-occupancy (iVASO) MRI for the quantification of arterial cerebral blood volume (CBVa). Magn Reson Med 2024; 91:1893-1907. [PMID: 38115573 PMCID: PMC10950541 DOI: 10.1002/mrm.29971] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2023] [Revised: 11/20/2023] [Accepted: 11/25/2023] [Indexed: 12/21/2023]
Abstract
PURPOSE The inflow-based vascular-space-occupancy (iVASO) MRI was originally developed in a single-slice mode to measure arterial cerebral blood volume (CBVa). When vascular crushers are applied in iVASO, the signals can be sensitized predominantly to small pial arteries and arterioles. The purpose of this study is to perform a systematic optimization and evaluation of a 3D iVASO sequence on both 3 T and 7 T for the quantification of CBVa values in the human brain. METHODS Three sets of experiments were performed in three separate cohorts. (1) 3D iVASO MRI protocols were compared to single-slice iVASO, and the reproducibility of whole-brain 3D iVASO MRI was evaluated. (2) The effects from different vascular crushers in iVASO were assessed. (3) 3D iVASO MRI results were evaluated in arterial and venous blood vessels identified using ultrasmall-superparamagnetic-iron-oxides-enhanced MRI to validate its arterial origin. RESULTS 3D iVASO scans showed signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and CBVa measures consistent with single-slice iVASO with reasonable intrasubject reproducibility. Among the iVASO scans performed with different vascular crushers, the whole-brain 3D iVASO scan with a motion-sensitized-driven-equilibrium preparation with two binomial refocusing pulses and an effective TE of 50 ms showed the best suppression of macrovascular signals, with a relatively low specific absorption rate. When no vascular crusher was applied, the CBVa maps from 3D iVASO scans showed large CBVa values in arterial vessels but well-suppressed signals in venous vessels. CONCLUSION A whole-brain 3D iVASO MRI scan was optimized for CBVa measurement in the human brain. When only microvascular signals are desired, a motion-sensitized-driven-equilibrium-based vascular crusher with binomial refocusing pulses can be applied in 3D iVASO.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chunming Gu
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Yinghao Li
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Di Cao
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Xinyuan Miao
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Adrian G. Paez
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Yuanqi Sun
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Jitong Cai
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Wenbo Li
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Xu Li
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Jay J. Pillai
- Department of Neurosurgery, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Division of Neuroradiology, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, Rochester, MN, United States
| | - Christopher J. Earley
- Department of Neurology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Peter C.M. van Zijl
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Jun Hua
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, United States
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Dresbach S, Huber R, Gulban OF, Pizzuti A, Trampel R, Ivanov D, Weiskopf N, Goebel R. Characterisation of laminar and vascular spatiotemporal dynamics of CBV and BOLD signals using VASO and ME-GRE at 7T in humans. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2024:2024.01.25.576050. [PMID: 38410457 PMCID: PMC10896347 DOI: 10.1101/2024.01.25.576050] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/28/2024]
Abstract
Interpretation of cortical laminar functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) activity requires detailed knowledge of the spatiotemporal haemodynamic response across vascular compartments due to the well-known vascular biases (e.g. the draining veins). Further complications arise from the spatiotemporal hemodynamic response that differs depending on the duration of stimulation. This information is crucial for future studies using depth-dependent cerebral blood volume (CBV) measurements, which promise higher specificity for the cortical microvasculature than the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) contrast. To date, direct information about CBV dynamics with respect to stimulus duration, cortical depth and vasculature is missing in humans. Therefore, we characterized the cortical depth-dependent CBV-haemodynamic responses across a wide set of stimulus durations with 0.9 mm isotropic spatial and 0.785 seconds effective temporal resolution in humans using slice-selective slab-inversion vascular space occupancy (SS-SI VASO). Additionally, we investigated signal contributions from macrovascular compartments using fine-scale vascular information from multi-echo gradient-echo (ME-GRE) data at 0.35 mm isotropic resolution. In total, this resulted in >7.5h of scanning per participant (n=5). We have three major findings: (I) While we could demonstrate that 1 second stimulation is viable using VASO, more than 12 seconds stimulation provides better CBV responses in terms of specificity to microvasculature, but durations beyond 24 seconds of stimulation may be wasteful for certain applications. (II) We observe that CBV responses show dilation patterns across the cortex. (III) While we found increasingly strong BOLD signal responses in vessel-dominated voxels with longer stimulation durations, we found increasingly strong CBV signal responses in vessel-dominated voxels only until 4 second stimulation durations. After 4 seconds, only the signal from non-vessel dominated voxels kept increasing. This might explain why CBV responses are more specific to the underlying neuronal activity for long stimulus durations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sebastian Dresbach
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- Department of Neurophysics, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Renzo Huber
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Omer Faruk Gulban
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- Brain innovation, Maastricht, the Netherlands
| | - Alessandra Pizzuti
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- Brain innovation, Maastricht, the Netherlands
| | - Robert Trampel
- Department of Neurophysics, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Dimo Ivanov
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | - Nikolaus Weiskopf
- Department of Neurophysics, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
- Felix Bloch Institute for Solid State Physics, Faculty of Physics and Earth System Sciences, Leipzig University, Linnéstraße 5, 04103 Leipzig, Germany
- Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging, Institute of Neurology, University College London, 12 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK
| | - Rainer Goebel
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- Brain innovation, Maastricht, the Netherlands
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Lin W, Zhao XY, Cheng JW, Li LT, Jiang Q, Zhang YX, Han F. Signaling pathways in brain ischemia: Mechanisms and therapeutic implications. Pharmacol Ther 2023; 251:108541. [PMID: 37783348 DOI: 10.1016/j.pharmthera.2023.108541] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/11/2023] [Revised: 09/18/2023] [Accepted: 09/25/2023] [Indexed: 10/04/2023]
Abstract
Ischemic stroke occurs when the arteries supplying blood to the brain are narrowed or blocked, inducing damage to brain tissue due to a lack of blood supply. One effective way to reduce brain damage and alleviate symptoms is to reopen blocked blood vessels in a timely manner and reduce neuronal damage. To achieve this, researchers have focused on identifying key cellular signaling pathways that can be targeted with drugs. These pathways include oxidative/nitrosative stress, excitatory amino acids and their receptors, inflammatory signaling molecules, metabolic pathways, ion channels, and other molecular events involved in stroke pathology. However, evidence suggests that solely focusing on protecting neurons may not yield satisfactory clinical results. Instead, researchers should consider the multifactorial and complex mechanisms underlying stroke pathology, including the interactions between different components of the neurovascular unit. Such an approach is more representative of the actual pathological process observed in clinical settings. This review summarizes recent research on the multiple molecular mechanisms and drug targets in ischemic stroke, as well as recent advances in novel therapeutic strategies. Finally, we discuss the challenges and future prospects of new strategies based on the biological characteristics of stroke.
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Affiliation(s)
- Wen Lin
- Medical Basic Research Innovation Center for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases, Ministry of Education, China; International Joint Laboratory for Drug Target of Critical Illnesses, Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Medicine, School of Pharmacy, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China
| | - Xiang-Yu Zhao
- Medical Basic Research Innovation Center for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases, Ministry of Education, China; International Joint Laboratory for Drug Target of Critical Illnesses, Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Medicine, School of Pharmacy, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China
| | - Jia-Wen Cheng
- Department of Physiology, School of Basic Medical Sciences, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China
| | - Li-Tao Li
- Department of Neurology, Hebei General Hospital, Shijiazhuang 050051, Hebei, China
| | - Quan Jiang
- Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
| | - Yi-Xuan Zhang
- Medical Basic Research Innovation Center for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases, Ministry of Education, China; International Joint Laboratory for Drug Target of Critical Illnesses, Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Medicine, School of Pharmacy, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China; Gusu School, Nanjing Medical University, Suzhou Municipal Hospital, The Affiliated Suzhou Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Suzhou 215002, China.
| | - Feng Han
- Medical Basic Research Innovation Center for Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Diseases, Ministry of Education, China; International Joint Laboratory for Drug Target of Critical Illnesses, Key Laboratory of Cardiovascular and Cerebrovascular Medicine, School of Pharmacy, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China; Gusu School, Nanjing Medical University, Suzhou Municipal Hospital, The Affiliated Suzhou Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Suzhou 215002, China; Institute of Brain Science, the Affiliated Brain Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing 211166, China.
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Dresbach S, Huber LR, Gulban OF, Goebel R. Layer-fMRI VASO with short stimuli and event-related designs at 7 T. Neuroimage 2023; 279:120293. [PMID: 37562717 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120293] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/23/2023] [Revised: 07/06/2023] [Accepted: 07/22/2023] [Indexed: 08/12/2023] Open
Abstract
Layers and columns are the dominant processing units in the human (neo)cortex at the mesoscopic scale. While the blood oxygenation dependent (BOLD) signal has a high detection sensitivity, it is biased towards unwanted signals from large draining veins at the cortical surface. The additional fMRI contrast of vascular space occupancy (VASO) has the potential to augment the neuroscientific interpretability of layer-fMRI results by means of capturing complementary information of locally specific changes in cerebral blood volume (CBV). Specifically, VASO is not subject to unwanted sensitivity amplifications of large draining veins. Because of constrained sampling efficiency, it has been mainly applied in combination with efficient block task designs and long trial durations. However, to study cognitive processes in neuroscientific contexts, or probe vascular reactivity, short stimulation periods are often necessary. Here, we developed a VASO acquisition procedure with a short acquisition period and sub-millimeter resolution. During visual event-related stimulation, we show reliable responses in visual cortices within a reasonable number of trials (∼20). Furthermore, the short TR and high spatial specificity of our VASO implementation enabled us to show differences in laminar reactivity and onset times. Finally, we explore the generalizability to a different stimulus modality (somatosensation). With this, we showed that CBV-sensitive VASO provides the means to capture layer-specific haemodynamic responses with high spatio-temporal resolution and is able to be used with event-related paradigms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sebastian Dresbach
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands.
| | - Laurentius Renzo Huber
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands; National Institute of Health, Bethesda, DC, USA
| | - Omer Faruk Gulban
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands; Brain Innovation, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | - Rainer Goebel
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands; Brain Innovation, Maastricht, Netherlands
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Pizzuti A, Huber L(R, Gulban OF, Benitez-Andonegui A, Peters J, Goebel R. Imaging the columnar functional organization of human area MT+ to axis-of-motion stimuli using VASO at 7 Tesla. Cereb Cortex 2023; 33:8693-8711. [PMID: 37254796 PMCID: PMC10321107 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhad151] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/11/2023] [Revised: 04/15/2023] [Accepted: 04/16/2023] [Indexed: 06/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Cortical columns of direction-selective neurons in the motion sensitive area (MT) have been successfully established as a microscopic feature of the neocortex in animals. The same property has been investigated at mesoscale (<1 mm) in the homologous brain area (hMT+, V5) in living humans by using ultra-high field functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Despite the reproducibility of the selective response to axis-of-motion stimuli, clear quantitative evidence for the columnar organization of hMT+ is still lacking. Using cerebral blood volume (CBV)-sensitive fMRI at 7 Tesla with submillimeter resolution and high spatial specificity to microvasculature, we investigate the columnar functional organization of hMT+ in 5 participants perceiving axis-of-motion stimuli for both blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) and vascular space occupancy (VASO) contrast mechanisms provided by the used slice-selective slab-inversion (SS-SI)-VASO sequence. With the development of a new searchlight algorithm for column detection, we provide the first quantitative columnarity map that characterizes the entire 3D hMT+ volume. Using voxel-wise measures of sensitivity and specificity, we demonstrate the advantage of using CBV-sensitive fMRI to detect mesoscopic cortical features by revealing higher specificity of axis-of-motion cortical columns for VASO as compared to BOLD contrast. These voxel-wise metrics also provide further insights on how to mitigate the highly debated draining veins effect. We conclude that using CBV-VASO fMRI together with voxel-wise measurements of sensitivity, specificity and columnarity offers a promising avenue to quantify the mesoscopic organization of hMT+ with respect to axis-of-motion stimuli. Furthermore, our approach and methodological developments are generalizable and applicable to other human brain areas where similar mesoscopic research questions are addressed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alessandra Pizzuti
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
- Brain Innovation, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Laurentius (Renzo) Huber
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
| | - Omer Faruk Gulban
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
- Brain Innovation, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | | | - Judith Peters
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
| | - Rainer Goebel
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
- Brain Innovation, Maastricht, The Netherlands
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Ivanov D, De Martino F, Formisano E, Fritz FJ, Goebel R, Huber L, Kashyap S, Kemper VG, Kurban D, Roebroeck A, Sengupta S, Sorger B, Tse DHY, Uludağ K, Wiggins CJ, Poser BA. Magnetic resonance imaging at 9.4 T: the Maastricht journey. MAGMA (NEW YORK, N.Y.) 2023; 36:159-173. [PMID: 37081247 PMCID: PMC10140139 DOI: 10.1007/s10334-023-01080-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/29/2022] [Revised: 03/18/2023] [Accepted: 03/20/2023] [Indexed: 04/22/2023]
Abstract
The 9.4 T scanner in Maastricht is a whole-body magnet with head gradients and parallel RF transmit capability. At the time of the design, it was conceptualized to be one of the best fMRI scanners in the world, but it has also been used for anatomical and diffusion imaging. 9.4 T offers increases in sensitivity and contrast, but the technical ultra-high field (UHF) challenges, such as field inhomogeneities and constraints set by RF power deposition, are exacerbated compared to 7 T. This article reviews some of the 9.4 T work done in Maastricht. Functional imaging experiments included blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) and blood-volume weighted (VASO) fMRI using different readouts. BOLD benefits from shorter T2* at 9.4 T while VASO from longer T1. We show examples of both ex vivo and in vivo anatomical imaging. For many applications, pTx and optimized coils are essential to harness the full potential of 9.4 T. Our experience shows that, while considerable effort was required compared to our 7 T scanner, we could obtain high-quality anatomical and functional data, which illustrates the potential of MR acquisitions at even higher field strengths. The practical challenges of working with a relatively unique system are also discussed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dimo Ivanov
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
| | - Federico De Martino
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Elia Formisano
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Francisco J Fritz
- Institute of Systems Neuroscience, Center for Experimental Medicine, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Hamburg, Germany
| | - Rainer Goebel
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Laurentius Huber
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Sriranga Kashyap
- Krembil Brain Institute, University Health Network, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Valentin G Kemper
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Denizhan Kurban
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Alard Roebroeck
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | | | - Bettina Sorger
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Desmond H Y Tse
- Scannexus BV, Oxfordlaan 55, 6229 EV, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Kâmil Uludağ
- Krembil Brain Institute, Koerner Scientist in MR Imaging, University Health Network Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Center for Neuroscience Imaging Research, Institute for Basic Science and Department of Biomedical Engineering, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon, Republic of Korea
| | - Christopher J Wiggins
- Imaging Core Facility (INM-ICF), Institut für Neurowissenschaften und Medizin, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, 52425, Jülich, Germany
| | - Benedikt A Poser
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 40, 6229 ER, Maastricht, The Netherlands
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Faes LK, De Martino F, Huber L(R. Cerebral blood volume sensitive layer-fMRI in the human auditory cortex at 7T: Challenges and capabilities. PLoS One 2023; 18:e0280855. [PMID: 36758009 PMCID: PMC9910709 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0280855] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/26/2022] [Accepted: 01/09/2023] [Indexed: 02/10/2023] Open
Abstract
The development of ultra high field fMRI signal readout strategies and contrasts has led to the possibility of imaging the human brain in vivo and non-invasively at increasingly higher spatial resolutions of cortical layers and columns. One emergent layer-fMRI acquisition method with increasing popularity is the cerebral blood volume sensitive sequence named vascular space occupancy (VASO). This approach has been shown to be mostly sensitive to locally-specific changes of laminar microvasculature, without unwanted biases of trans-laminar draining veins. Until now, however, VASO has not been applied in the technically challenging cortical area of the auditory cortex. Here, we describe the main challenges we encountered when developing a VASO protocol for auditory neuroscientific applications and the solutions we have adopted. With the resulting protocol, we present preliminary results of laminar responses to sounds and as a proof of concept for future investigations, we map the topographic representation of frequency preference (tonotopy) in the auditory cortex.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lonike K. Faes
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
- * E-mail:
| | - Federico De Martino
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
- Department of Radiology, Center for Magnetic Resonance Research, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States of America
| | - Laurentius (Renzo) Huber
- Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
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Huber L, Kassavetis P, Gulban OF, Hallett M, Horovitz SG. Laminar VASO fMRI in focal hand dystonia patients. DYSTONIA 2023; 2. [PMID: 37035517 PMCID: PMC10081516 DOI: 10.3389/dyst.2023.10806] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/04/2023]
Abstract
Focal Hand Dystonia (FHD) is a disabling movement disorder characterized by involuntary movements, cramps and spasms. It is associated with pathological neural microcircuits in the cortical somatosensory system. While invasive preclinical modalities allow researchers to probe specific neural microcircuits of cortical layers and columns, conventional functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) cannot resolve such small neural computational units. In this study, we take advantage of recent developments in ultra-high-field MRI hardware and MR-sequences to capture altered digit representations and laminar processing in FHD patients. We aim to characterize the capability and challenges of layer-specific imaging and analysis tools in resolving laminar and columnar structures in clinical research setups. We scanned N = 4 affected and N = 5 unaffected hemispheres at 7T and found consistent results of altered neural microcircuitry in FHD patients: 1) In affected hemispheres of FHD patients, we found a breakdown of ordered finger representation in the primary somatosensory cortex, as suggested from previous low-resolution fMRI. 2) In affected primary motor cortices of FHD patients, we furthermore found increased fMRI activity in superficial cortico-cortical neural input layers (II/III), compared to relatively weaker activity in the cortico-spinal output layers (Vb/VI). Overall, we show that layer-fMRI acquisition and analysis tools have the potential to address clinically-driven neuroscience research questions about altered computational mechanisms at the spatial scales that were previously only accessible in animal models. We believe that this study paves the way for easier translation of preclinical work into clinical research in focal hand dystonia and beyond.
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Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Huber
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | - Panagiotis Kassavetis
- Department of Neurology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, United States
- Human Motor Control Section, NINDS, NIH, Bethesda, MD, United States
| | - Omer Faruk Gulban
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
- Brain Innovation, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | - Mark Hallett
- Human Motor Control Section, NINDS, NIH, Bethesda, MD, United States
| | - Silvina G. Horovitz
- Human Motor Control Section, NINDS, NIH, Bethesda, MD, United States
- CORRESPONDENCE Silvina G. Horovitz,
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Pfaffenrot V, Koopmans PJ. Magnetization transfer weighted laminar fMRI with multi-echo FLASH. Neuroimage 2022; 264:119725. [PMID: 36328273 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2022.119725] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/10/2022] [Revised: 10/13/2022] [Accepted: 10/30/2022] [Indexed: 11/06/2022] Open
Abstract
Laminar functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) using the gradient echo (GRE) blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) contrast is prone to signal changes arising from large unspecific venous vessels. Alternatives based on changes of cerebral blood volume (CBV) become more popular since it is expected that this hemodynamic response is dominant in microvasculature. One approach to sensitize the signal toward changes in CBV, and to simultaneously reduce unwanted extravascular (EV) BOLD blurring, is to selectively reduce gray matter (GM) signal via magnetization transfer (MT). In this work, we use off-resonant MT-pulses with a 3D FLASH readout to perform MT-prepared (MT-prep) laminar fMRI of the primary visual cortex (V1) at multiple echo times at 7 T. With a GRE-BOLD contrast without additional MT-weighting as reference, we investigated the influence of the MT-preparation on the shape and the echo time dependency of laminar profiles. Through numerical simulations, we optimized the sequence parameters to increase the sensitivity toward signal changes induced by changes in arterial CBV and to delineate the contributions of different compartments to the signal. We show that at 7 T, GM signals can be reduced by 30 %. Our laminar fMRI responses exhibit an increased signal change in the parenchyma at very short TE compared to a BOLD-only reference as a result of reduced EV signal intensity. By varying echo times, we could show that MT-prep results in less sensitivity toward unwanted signal changes based on changes in T2*. We conclude that when accounting for nuclear overhauser enhancement effects in blood, off-resonant MT-prep combined with efficient short TE readouts can become a promising method to reduce unwanted EV venous contributions in GRE-BOLD and/or to allow scanning at much shorter echo times without incurring a sensitivity penalty in laminar fMRI.
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Affiliation(s)
- Viktor Pfaffenrot
- Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic Resonance Imaging, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45141 Essen, Germany; High Field and Hybrid MR Imaging, University Hospital Essen, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45147 Essen, Germany.
| | - Peter J Koopmans
- Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic Resonance Imaging, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45141 Essen, Germany; High Field and Hybrid MR Imaging, University Hospital Essen, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45147 Essen, Germany; Department of Radiation Oncology, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, the Netherlands
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10
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Ding B, Dragonu I, Rua C, Carlin JD, Halai AD, Liebig P, Heidemann R, Correia MM, Rodgers CT. Parallel transmit (pTx) with online pulse design for task-based fMRI at 7 T. Magn Reson Imaging 2022; 93:163-174. [PMID: 35863691 DOI: 10.1016/j.mri.2022.07.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/02/2021] [Revised: 06/17/2022] [Accepted: 07/11/2022] [Indexed: 10/31/2022]
Abstract
PURPOSE Parallel transmission (pTx) is an approach to improve image uniformity for ultra-high field imaging. In this study, we modified an echo planar imaging (EPI) sequence to design subject-specific pTx pulses online. We compared its performance against EPI with conventional circularly polarised (CP) pulses. METHODS We compared the pTx-EPI and CP-EPI sequences in a short EPI acquisition protocol and for two different functional paradigms in six healthy volunteers (2 female, aged 23-36 years, mean age 29.2 years). We chose two paradigms that are typically affected by signal dropout at 7 T: a visual objects localiser to determine face/scene selective brain regions and a semantic-processing task. RESULTS Across all subjects, pTx-EPI improved whole-brain mean temporal signal-to-noise ratio (tSNR) by 11.0% compared to CP-EPI. We also compared the ability of pTx-EPI and CP-EPI to detect functional activation for three contrasts over the two paradigms: face > object and scene > object for the visual objects localiser and semantic association > pattern matching for the semantic-processing paradigm. Across all three contrasts, pTx-EPI showed higher median z-scores and detected more active voxels in relevant areas, as determined from previous 3 T studies. CONCLUSION We have demonstrated a workflow for EPI acquisitions with online per-subject pulse calculations. We saw improved performance in both tSNR and functional acquisitions from pTx-EPI. Thus, we believe that online calculation pTx-EPI is robust enough for future fMRI studies, especially where activation is expected in brain areas liable to significant signal dropout.
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Affiliation(s)
- Belinda Ding
- Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre, University of Cambridge, UK.
| | | | - Catarina Rua
- Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre, University of Cambridge, UK; Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Cambridge, UK; Invicro, Invicro London, UK
| | | | - Ajay D Halai
- MRC Cognition and Brain Science Unit, Cambridge, UK
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11
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Akbari A, Bollmann S, Ali TS, Barth M. Modelling the depth-dependent VASO and BOLD responses in human primary visual cortex. Hum Brain Mapp 2022; 44:710-726. [PMID: 36189837 PMCID: PMC9842911 DOI: 10.1002/hbm.26094] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/10/2022] [Revised: 08/05/2022] [Accepted: 08/07/2022] [Indexed: 01/25/2023] Open
Abstract
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) using a blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) contrast is a common method for studying human brain function noninvasively. Gradient-echo (GRE) BOLD is highly sensitive to the blood oxygenation change in blood vessels; however, the spatial signal specificity can be degraded due to signal leakage from activated lower layers to superficial layers in depth-dependent (also called laminar or layer-specific) fMRI. Alternatively, physiological variables such as cerebral blood volume using the VAscular-Space-Occupancy (VASO) contrast have shown higher spatial specificity compared to BOLD. To better understand the physiological mechanisms such as blood volume and oxygenation changes and to interpret the measured depth-dependent responses, models are needed which reflect vascular properties at this scale. For this purpose, we extended and modified the "cortical vascular model" previously developed to predict layer-specific BOLD signal changes in human primary visual cortex to also predict a layer-specific VASO response. To evaluate the model, we compared the predictions with experimental results of simultaneous VASO and BOLD measurements in a group of healthy participants. Fitting the model to our experimental data provided an estimate of CBV change in different vascular compartments upon neural activity. We found that stimulus-evoked CBV change mainly occurs in small arterioles, capillaries, and intracortical arteries and that the contribution from venules and ICVs is smaller. Our results confirm that VASO is less susceptible to large vessel effects compared to BOLD, as blood volume changes in intracortical arteries did not substantially affect the resulting depth-dependent VASO profiles, whereas depth-dependent BOLD profiles showed a bias towards signal contributions from intracortical veins.
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Affiliation(s)
- Atena Akbari
- Centre for Advanced ImagingUniversity of QueenslandBrisbaneAustralia
| | - Saskia Bollmann
- Centre for Advanced ImagingUniversity of QueenslandBrisbaneAustralia
| | - Tonima S. Ali
- Centre for Advanced ImagingUniversity of QueenslandBrisbaneAustralia
| | - Markus Barth
- Centre for Advanced ImagingUniversity of QueenslandBrisbaneAustralia,ARC Training Centre for Innovation in Biomedical Imaging TechnologyThe University of QueenslandBrisbaneAustralia,School of Information Technology and Electrical EngineeringThe University of QueenslandBrisbaneQueenslandAustralia
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12
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Okada T, Fujimoto K, Fushimi Y, Akasaka T, Thuy DHD, Shima A, Sawamoto N, Oishi N, Zhang Z, Funaki T, Nakamoto Y, Murai T, Miyamoto S, Takahashi R, Isa T. Neuroimaging at 7 Tesla: a pictorial narrative review. Quant Imaging Med Surg 2022; 12:3406-3435. [PMID: 35655840 PMCID: PMC9131333 DOI: 10.21037/qims-21-969] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/14/2021] [Accepted: 02/05/2022] [Indexed: 01/26/2024]
Abstract
Neuroimaging using the 7-Tesla (7T) human magnetic resonance (MR) system is rapidly gaining popularity after being approved for clinical use in the European Union and the USA. This trend is the same for functional MR imaging (MRI). The primary advantages of 7T over lower magnetic fields are its higher signal-to-noise and contrast-to-noise ratios, which provide high-resolution acquisitions and better contrast, making it easier to detect lesions and structural changes in brain disorders. Another advantage is the capability to measure a greater number of neurochemicals by virtue of the increased spectral resolution. Many structural and functional studies using 7T have been conducted to visualize details in the white matter and layers of the cortex and hippocampus, the subnucleus or regions of the putamen, the globus pallidus, thalamus and substantia nigra, and in small structures, such as the subthalamic nucleus, habenula, perforating arteries, and the perivascular space, that are difficult to observe at lower magnetic field strengths. The target disorders for 7T neuroimaging range from tumoral diseases to vascular, neurodegenerative, and psychiatric disorders, including Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, major depressive disorder, and schizophrenia. MR spectroscopy has also been used for research because of its increased chemical shift that separates overlapping peaks and resolves neurochemicals more effectively at 7T than a lower magnetic field. This paper presents a narrative review of these topics and an illustrative presentation of images obtained at 7T. We expect 7T neuroimaging to provide a new imaging biomarker of various brain disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tomohisa Okada
- Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Koji Fujimoto
- Department of Real World Data Research and Development, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Yasutaka Fushimi
- Department of Diagnostic Imaging and Nuclear Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Thai Akasaka
- Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Dinh H. D. Thuy
- Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Atsushi Shima
- Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Nobukatsu Sawamoto
- Department of Human Health Sciences, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Naoya Oishi
- Medial Innovation Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Zhilin Zhang
- Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Takeshi Funaki
- Department of Neurosurgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Yuji Nakamoto
- Department of Diagnostic Imaging and Nuclear Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Toshiya Murai
- Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Susumu Miyamoto
- Department of Neurosurgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Ryosuke Takahashi
- Department of Neurology, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
| | - Tadashi Isa
- Human Brain Research Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
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13
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Huber LR, Poser BA, Kaas AL, Fear EJ, Dresbach S, Berwick J, Goebel R, Turner R, Kennerley AJ. Validating layer-specific VASO across species. Neuroimage 2021; 237:118195. [PMID: 34038769 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.118195] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/24/2020] [Revised: 05/17/2021] [Accepted: 05/19/2021] [Indexed: 01/27/2023] Open
Abstract
Cerebral blood volume (CBV) has been shown to be a robust and important physiological parameter for quantitative interpretation of functional (f)MRI, capable of delivering highly localized mapping of neural activity. Indeed, with recent advances in ultra-high-field (≥7T) MRI hardware and associated sequence libraries, it has become possible to capture non-invasive CBV weighted fMRI signals across cortical layers. One of the most widely used approaches to achieve this (in humans) is through vascular-space-occupancy (VASO) fMRI. Unfortunately, the exact contrast mechanisms of layer-dependent VASO fMRI have not been validated for human fMRI and thus interpretation of such data is confounded. Here we validate the signal source of layer-dependent SS-SI VASO fMRI using multi-modal imaging in a rat model in response to neuronal activation (somatosensory cortex) and respiratory challenge (hypercapnia). In particular VASO derived CBV measures are directly compared to concurrent measures of total haemoglobin changes from high resolution intrinsic optical imaging spectroscopy (OIS). Quantified cortical layer profiling is demonstrated to be in agreement between VASO and contrast enhanced fMRI (using monocrystalline iron oxide nanoparticles, MION). Responses show high spatial localisation to layers of cortical processing independent of confounding large draining veins which can hamper BOLD fMRI studies, (depending on slice positioning). Thus, a cross species comparison is enabled using VASO as a common measure. We find increased VASO based CBV reactivity (3.1 ± 1.2 fold increase) in humans compared to rats. Together, our findings confirm that the VASO contrast is indeed a reliable estimate of layer-specific CBV changes. This validation study increases the neuronal interpretability of human layer-dependent VASO fMRI as an appropriate method in neuroscience application studies, in which the presence of large draining intracortical and pial veins limits neuroscientific inference with BOLD fMRI.
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Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Renzo Huber
- MBIC, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, the Netherlands.
| | - Benedikt A Poser
- MBIC, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, the Netherlands
| | - Amanda L Kaas
- MBIC, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, the Netherlands
| | - Elizabeth J Fear
- Hull-York-Medical-School (HYMS), University of York, York, United Kingdom
| | - Sebastian Dresbach
- MBIC, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, the Netherlands
| | - Jason Berwick
- Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
| | - Rainer Goebel
- MBIC, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, the Netherlands
| | - Robert Turner
- Neurophysics Department Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; Sir Peter Mansfield Imaging Centre, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, United Kingdom
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14
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Callewaert B, Jones EAV, Himmelreich U, Gsell W. Non-Invasive Evaluation of Cerebral Microvasculature Using Pre-Clinical MRI: Principles, Advantages and Limitations. Diagnostics (Basel) 2021; 11:diagnostics11060926. [PMID: 34064194 PMCID: PMC8224283 DOI: 10.3390/diagnostics11060926] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/30/2021] [Revised: 05/16/2021] [Accepted: 05/17/2021] [Indexed: 12/11/2022] Open
Abstract
Alterations to the cerebral microcirculation have been recognized to play a crucial role in the development of neurodegenerative disorders. However, the exact role of the microvascular alterations in the pathophysiological mechanisms often remains poorly understood. The early detection of changes in microcirculation and cerebral blood flow (CBF) can be used to get a better understanding of underlying disease mechanisms. This could be an important step towards the development of new treatment approaches. Animal models allow for the study of the disease mechanism at several stages of development, before the onset of clinical symptoms, and the verification with invasive imaging techniques. Specifically, pre-clinical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is an important tool for the development and validation of MRI sequences under clinically relevant conditions. This article reviews MRI strategies providing indirect non-invasive measurements of microvascular changes in the rodent brain that can be used for early detection and characterization of neurodegenerative disorders. The perfusion MRI techniques: Dynamic Contrast Enhanced (DCE), Dynamic Susceptibility Contrast Enhanced (DSC) and Arterial Spin Labeling (ASL), will be discussed, followed by less established imaging strategies used to analyze the cerebral microcirculation: Intravoxel Incoherent Motion (IVIM), Vascular Space Occupancy (VASO), Steady-State Susceptibility Contrast (SSC), Vessel size imaging, SAGE-based DSC, Phase Contrast Flow (PC) Quantitative Susceptibility Mapping (QSM) and quantitative Blood-Oxygenation-Level-Dependent (qBOLD). We will emphasize the advantages and limitations of each strategy, in particular on applications for high-field MRI in the rodent's brain.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bram Callewaert
- Biomedical MRI Group, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, bus 505, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; (B.C.); (W.G.)
- CMVB, Center for Molecular and Vascular Biology, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, bus 911, 3000 Leuven, Belgium;
| | - Elizabeth A. V. Jones
- CMVB, Center for Molecular and Vascular Biology, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, bus 911, 3000 Leuven, Belgium;
- CARIM, Maastricht University, Universiteitssingel 50, 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Uwe Himmelreich
- Biomedical MRI Group, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, bus 505, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; (B.C.); (W.G.)
- Correspondence:
| | - Willy Gsell
- Biomedical MRI Group, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, bus 505, 3000 Leuven, Belgium; (B.C.); (W.G.)
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15
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Paez AG, Gu C, Rajan S, Miao X, Cao D, Kamath V, Bakker A, Unschuld PG, Pantelyat AY, Rosenthal LS, Hua J. Differential Changes in Arteriolar Cerebral Blood Volume between Parkinson's Disease Patients with Normal and Impaired Cognition and Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) Patients without Movement Disorder - An Exploratory Study. Tomography 2020; 6:333-342. [PMID: 33364423 PMCID: PMC7744190 DOI: 10.18383/j.tom.2020.00033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Cognitive impairment amongst Parkinson's disease (PD) patients is highly prevalent and associated with an increased risk of dementia. There is growing evidence that altered cerebrovascular functions contribute to cognitive impairment. Few studies have compared cerebrovascular changes in PD patients with normal and impaired cognition and those with mild-cognitive-impairment (MCI) without movement disorder. Here, we investigated arteriolar-cerebral-blood-volume (CBVa), an index reflecting the homeostasis of the most actively regulated segment in the microvasculature, using advanced MRI in various brain regions in PD and MCI patients and matched controls. Our goal is to find brain regions with altered CBVa that are specific to PD with normal and impaired cognition, and MCI-without-movement-disorder, respectively. In PD patients with normal cognition (n=10), CBVa was significantly decreased in the substantia nigra, caudate and putamen when compared to controls. In PD patients with impaired cognition (n=6), CBVa showed a decreasing trend in the substantia nigra, caudate and putamen, but was significantly increased in the presupplementary motor area and intracalcarine gyrus compared to controls. In MCI-patients-without-movement-disorder (n=18), CBVa was significantly increased in the caudate, putamen, hippocampus and lingual gyrus compared to controls. These findings provide important information for efforts towards developing biomarkers for the evaluation of potential risk of PD dementia (PDD) in PD patients. The current study is limited in sample size and therefore is exploratory in nature. The data from this pilot study will serve as the basis for power analysis for subsequent studies to further investigate and validate the current findings.
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Affiliation(s)
- Adrian G. Paez
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
- Neurosection, Division of MR Research, Department of Radiology
| | - Chunming Gu
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
- Neurosection, Division of MR Research, Department of Radiology
| | - Suraj Rajan
- Department of Neurology; and
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD; and
| | - Xinyuan Miao
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
- Neurosection, Division of MR Research, Department of Radiology
| | - Di Cao
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
- Neurosection, Division of MR Research, Department of Radiology
- Department of Biomedical Engineering
| | - Vidyulata Kamath
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD; and
| | - Arnold Bakker
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD; and
| | - Paul G. Unschuld
- Department of Psychogeriatric Medicine, Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | | | | | - Jun Hua
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
- Neurosection, Division of MR Research, Department of Radiology
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16
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Beckett AJS, Dadakova T, Townsend J, Huber L, Park S, Feinberg DA. Comparison of BOLD and CBV using 3D EPI and 3D GRASE for cortical layer functional MRI at 7 T. Magn Reson Med 2020; 84:3128-3145. [PMID: 32557752 DOI: 10.1002/mrm.28347] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/14/2019] [Revised: 05/12/2020] [Accepted: 05/14/2020] [Indexed: 01/27/2023]
Abstract
PURPOSE Functional MRI (fMRI) at the mesoscale of cortical layers and columns requires both sensitivity and specificity, the latter of which can be compromised if the imaging method is affected by vascular artifacts, particularly cortical draining veins at the pial surface. Recent studies have shown that cerebral blood volume (CBV) imaging is more specific to the actual laminar locus of neural activity than BOLD imaging using standard gradient-echo EPI sequences. Gradient and spin-echo (GRASE) BOLD imaging has also shown greater specificity when compared with standard gradient-echo EPI BOLD. Here we directly compare CBV and BOLD contrasts in high-resolution imaging of the primary motor cortex for laminar functional MRI in four combinations of signal labeling, CBV using slice-selective slab-inversion vascular space occupancy (VASO) and BOLD, each with 3D gradient-echo EPI and zoomed 3D-GRASE image readouts. METHODS Activations were measured using each sequence and contrast combination during a motor task. Activation profiles across cortical depth were measured to assess the sensitivity and specificity (pial bias) of each method. RESULTS Both CBV imaging using gradient-echo 3D-EPI and BOLD imaging using 3D-GRASE show similar specificity and sensitivity and are therefore useful tools for mesoscopic functional MRI in the human cortex. The combination of GRASE and VASO did not demonstrate high levels of sensitivity, nor show increased specificity. CONCLUSION Three-dimensional EPI with VASO contrast and 3D-GRASE with BOLD contrast both demonstrate sufficient sensitivity and specificity for laminar functional MRI to be used by neuroscientists in a wide range of investigations of depth-dependent neural circuitry in the human brain.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexander J S Beckett
- Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.,Advanced MRI Technologies, Sebastopol, California, USA
| | - Tetiana Dadakova
- Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA
| | - Jennifer Townsend
- Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.,Advanced MRI Technologies, Sebastopol, California, USA
| | - Laurentius Huber
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, the Netherlands
| | - Suhyung Park
- Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.,Advanced MRI Technologies, Sebastopol, California, USA
| | - David A Feinberg
- Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.,Advanced MRI Technologies, Sebastopol, California, USA
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17
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Layer-dependent functional connectivity methods. Prog Neurobiol 2020; 207:101835. [DOI: 10.1016/j.pneurobio.2020.101835] [Citation(s) in RCA: 39] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/27/2020] [Revised: 03/30/2020] [Accepted: 05/21/2020] [Indexed: 12/16/2022]
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18
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Huber L, Finn ES, Handwerker DA, Bönstrup M, Glen DR, Kashyap S, Ivanov D, Petridou N, Marrett S, Goense J, Poser BA, Bandettini PA. Sub-millimeter fMRI reveals multiple topographical digit representations that form action maps in human motor cortex. Neuroimage 2020; 208:116463. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.116463] [Citation(s) in RCA: 55] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/06/2019] [Revised: 11/10/2019] [Accepted: 12/11/2019] [Indexed: 12/31/2022] Open
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19
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Guidi M, Huber L, Lampe L, Merola A, Ihle K, Möller HE. Cortical laminar resting-state signal fluctuations scale with the hypercapnic blood oxygenation level-dependent response. Hum Brain Mapp 2020; 41:2014-2027. [PMID: 31957959 PMCID: PMC7267967 DOI: 10.1002/hbm.24926] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/02/2019] [Revised: 12/17/2019] [Accepted: 01/05/2020] [Indexed: 11/06/2022] Open
Abstract
Calibrated functional magnetic resonance imaging can remove unwanted sources of signal variability in the blood oxygenation level‐dependent (BOLD) response. This is achieved by scaling, using information from a perfusion‐sensitive scan during a purely vascular challenge, typically induced by a gas manipulation or a breath‐hold task. In this work, we seek for a validation of the use of the resting‐state fluctuation amplitude (RSFA) as a scaling factor to remove vascular contributions from the BOLD response. Given the peculiarity of depth‐dependent vascularization in gray matter, BOLD and vascular space occupancy (VASO) data were acquired at submillimeter resolution and averaged across cortical laminae. RSFA from the primary motor cortex was, thus, compared to the amplitude of hypercapnia‐induced signal changes (tSDhc) and with the M factor of the Davis model on a laminar level. High linear correlations were observed for RSFA and tSDhc (R2 = 0.92 ± 0.06) and somewhat reduced for RSFA and M (R2 = 0.62 ± 0.19). Laminar profiles of RSFA‐normalized BOLD signal changes yielded good agreement with corresponding VASO profiles. Overall, this suggests that RSFA contains strong vascular components and is also modulated by baseline quantities contained in the M factor. We conclude that RSFA may replace the scaling factor tSDhc for normalizing the laminar BOLD response.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maria Guidi
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Laurentius Huber
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands
| | - Leonie Lampe
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Alberto Merola
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Kristin Ihle
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Harald E Möller
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
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20
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Non-BOLD contrast for laminar fMRI in humans: CBF, CBV, and CMRO2. Neuroimage 2019; 197:742-760. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.07.041] [Citation(s) in RCA: 78] [Impact Index Per Article: 15.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/09/2017] [Revised: 07/10/2017] [Accepted: 07/19/2017] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
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21
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Kay K, Jamison KW, Vizioli L, Zhang R, Margalit E, Ugurbil K. A critical assessment of data quality and venous effects in sub-millimeter fMRI. Neuroimage 2019; 189:847-869. [PMID: 30731246 PMCID: PMC7737092 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.02.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 56] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/03/2018] [Revised: 02/02/2019] [Accepted: 02/04/2019] [Indexed: 01/07/2023] Open
Abstract
Advances in hardware, pulse sequences, and reconstruction techniques have made it possible to perform functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at sub-millimeter resolution while maintaining high spatial coverage and acceptable signal-to-noise ratio. Here, we examine whether sub-millimeter fMRI can be used as a routine method for obtaining accurate measurements of fine-scale local neural activity. We conducted fMRI in human visual cortex during a simple event-related visual experiment (7 T, gradient-echo EPI, 0.8-mm isotropic voxels, 2.2-s sampling rate, 84 slices), and developed analysis and visualization tools to assess the quality of the data. Our results fall along three lines of inquiry. First, we find that the acquired fMRI images, combined with appropriate surface-based processing, provide reliable and accurate measurements of fine-scale blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) activity patterns. Second, we show that the highly folded structure of cortex causes substantial biases on spatial resolution and data visualization. Third, we examine the well-recognized issue of venous contributions to fMRI signals. In a systematic assessment of large sections of cortex measured at a fine scale, we show that time-averaged T2*-weighted EPI intensity is a simple, robust marker of venous effects. These venous effects are unevenly distributed across cortex, are more pronounced in gyri and outer cortical depths, and are, to a certain degree, in consistent locations across subjects relative to cortical folding. Furthermore, we show that these venous effects are strongly correlated with BOLD responses evoked by the experiment. We conclude that sub-millimeter fMRI can provide robust information about fine-scale BOLD activity patterns, but special care must be exercised in visualizing and interpreting these patterns, especially with regards to the confounding influence of the brain's vasculature. To help translate these methodological findings to neuroscience research, we provide practical suggestions for both high-resolution and standard-resolution fMRI studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kendrick Kay
- Center for Magnetic Resonance Research (CMRR), Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, USA.
| | - Keith W Jamison
- Center for Magnetic Resonance Research (CMRR), Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, USA
| | - Luca Vizioli
- Center for Magnetic Resonance Research (CMRR), Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, USA
| | - Ruyuan Zhang
- Center for Magnetic Resonance Research (CMRR), Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, USA
| | - Eshed Margalit
- Stanford Neurosciences Institute, Stanford University, USA
| | - Kamil Ugurbil
- Center for Magnetic Resonance Research (CMRR), Department of Radiology, University of Minnesota, USA
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22
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Hua J, Lee S, Blair NIS, Wyss M, van Bergen JMG, Schreiner SJ, Kagerer SM, Leh SE, Gietl AF, Treyer V, Buck A, Nitsch RM, Pruessmann KP, Lu H, Van Zijl PCM, Albert M, Hock C, Unschuld PG. Increased cerebral blood volume in small arterial vessels is a correlate of amyloid-β-related cognitive decline. Neurobiol Aging 2019; 76:181-193. [PMID: 30738323 DOI: 10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2019.01.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/15/2018] [Revised: 01/01/2019] [Accepted: 01/02/2019] [Indexed: 12/22/2022]
Abstract
The protracted accumulation of amyloid-β (Aβ) is a major pathologic hallmark of Alzheimer's disease and may trigger secondary pathological processes that include neurovascular damage. This study was aimed at investigating long-term effects of Aβ burden on cerebral blood volume of arterioles and pial arteries (CBVa), possibly present before manifestation of dementia. Aβ burden was assessed by 11C Pittsburgh compound-B positron emission tomography in 22 controls and 18 persons with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), [ages: 75(±6) years]. After 2 years, inflow-based vascular space occupancy at ultra-high field strength of 7-Tesla was administered for measuring CBVa, and neuropsychological testing for cognitive decline. Crushing gradients were incorporated during MR-imaging to suppress signals from fast-flowing blood in large arteries, and thereby sensitize inflow-based vascular space occupancy to CBVa in pial arteries and arterioles. CBVa was significantly elevated in MCI compared to cognitively normal controls and regional CBVa related to local Aβ deposition. For both MCI and controls, Aβ burden and follow-up CBVa in several brain regions synergistically predicted cognitive decline over 2 years. Orbitofrontal CBVa was positively associated with apolipoprotein E e4 carrier status. Increased CBVa may reflect long-term effects of region-specific pathology associated with Aβ deposition. Additional studies are needed to clarify the role of the arteriolar system and the potential of CBVa as a biomarker for Aβ-related vascular downstream pathology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jun Hua
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Department of Radiology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA; F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - SeungWook Lee
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Nicholas I S Blair
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Michael Wyss
- Institute for Biomedical Engineering, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Jiri M G van Bergen
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland
| | - Simon J Schreiner
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland; Hospital for Psychogeriatric Medicine, Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich (PUK), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Sonja M Kagerer
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland; Hospital for Psychogeriatric Medicine, Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich (PUK), Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Sandra E Leh
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland
| | - Anton F Gietl
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland
| | - Valerie Treyer
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland; Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Alfred Buck
- Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Roger M Nitsch
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland
| | - Klaas P Pruessmann
- Institute for Biomedical Engineering, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - Hanzhang Lu
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Department of Radiology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA; F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Peter C M Van Zijl
- Neurosection, Division of MRI Research, Department of Radiology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA; F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Marilyn Albert
- Department of Neurology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Christoph Hock
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland
| | - Paul G Unschuld
- Institute for Regenerative Medicine (IREM), University of Zurich, Schlieren, Switzerland; Hospital for Psychogeriatric Medicine, Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich (PUK), Zurich, Switzerland.
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23
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Huber L, Tse DHY, Wiggins CJ, Uludağ K, Kashyap S, Jangraw DC, Bandettini PA, Poser BA, Ivanov D. Ultra-high resolution blood volume fMRI and BOLD fMRI in humans at 9.4 T: Capabilities and challenges. Neuroimage 2018; 178:769-779. [PMID: 29890330 PMCID: PMC6100753 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2018.06.025] [Citation(s) in RCA: 35] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/12/2018] [Revised: 05/23/2018] [Accepted: 06/07/2018] [Indexed: 12/31/2022] Open
Abstract
Functional mapping of cerebral blood volume (CBV) changes has the potential to reveal brain activity with high localization specificity at the level of cortical layers and columns. Non-invasive CBV imaging using Vascular Space Occupancy (VASO) at ultra-high magnetic field strengths promises high spatial specificity but poses unique challenges in human applications. As such, 9.4 T B1+ and B0 inhomogeneities limit efficient blood tagging, while the specific absorption rate (SAR) constraints limit the application of VASO-specific RF pulses. Moreover, short T2* values at 9.4 T require short readout duration, and long T1 values at 9.4 T can cause blood-inflow contaminations. In this study, we investigated the applicability of layer-dependent CBV-fMRI at 9.4 T in humans. We addressed the aforementioned challenges by combining multiple technical advancements: temporally alternating pTx B1+ shimming parameters, advanced adiabatic RF-pulses, 3D-EPI signal readout, optimized GRAPPA acquisition and reconstruction, and stability-optimized RF channel combination. We found that a combination of suitable advanced methodology alleviates the challenges and potential artifacts, and that VASO fMRI provides reliable measures of CBV change across cortical layers in humans at 9.4 T. The localization specificity of CBV-fMRI, combined with the high sensitivity of 9.4 T, makes this method an important tool for future studies investigating cortical micro-circuitry in humans.
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Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Huber
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA.
| | - Desmond H Y Tse
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Center, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands; Centre for Advanced Imaging, University of Queensland, Australia
| | | | - Kâmil Uludağ
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Center, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Sriranga Kashyap
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Center, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - David C Jangraw
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Peter A Bandettini
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA; FMRIF, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Benedikt A Poser
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Center, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Dimo Ivanov
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Center, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
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24
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Advances in MR angiography with 7T MRI: From microvascular imaging to functional angiography. Neuroimage 2018; 168:269-278. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.01.019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 26] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/29/2016] [Revised: 01/03/2017] [Accepted: 01/09/2017] [Indexed: 01/15/2023] Open
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25
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Poser BA, Setsompop K. Pulse sequences and parallel imaging for high spatiotemporal resolution MRI at ultra-high field. Neuroimage 2018; 168:101-118. [PMID: 28392492 PMCID: PMC5630499 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.04.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 42] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/12/2016] [Revised: 04/01/2017] [Accepted: 04/03/2017] [Indexed: 12/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The SNR and CNR benefits of ultra-high field (UHF) have helped push the envelope of achievable spatial resolution in MRI. For applications based on susceptibility contrast where there is a large CNR gain, high quality sub-millimeter resolution imaging is now being routinely performed, particularly in fMRI and phase imaging/QSM. This has enabled the study of structure and function of very fine-scale structures in the brain. UHF has also helped push the spatial resolution of many other MRI applications as will be outlined in this review. However, this push in resolution comes at a cost of a large encoding burden leading to very lengthy scans. Developments in parallel imaging with controlled aliasing and the move away from 2D slice-by-slice imaging to much more SNR-efficient simultaneous multi-slice (SMS) and 3D acquisitions have helped address this issue. In particular, these developments have revolutionized the efficiency of UHF MRI to enable high spatiotemporal resolution imaging at an order of magnitude faster acquisition. In addition to describing the main approaches to these techniques, this review will also outline important key practical considerations in using these methods in practice. Furthermore, new RF pulse design to tackle the B1+ and SAR issues of UHF and the increased SAR and power requirement of SMS RF pulses will also be touched upon. Finally, an outlook into new developments of smart encoding in more dimensions, particularly through using better temporal/across-contrast encoding and reconstruction will be described. Just as controlled aliasing fully exploits spatial encoding in parallel imaging to provide large multiplicative gains in accelerations, the complimentary use of these new approaches in temporal and across-contrast encoding are expected to provide exciting opportunities for further large gains in efficiency to further push the spatiotemporal resolution of MRI.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benedikt A Poser
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands.
| | - Kawin Setsompop
- Department of Radiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA; Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA
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26
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Polimeni JR, Renvall V, Zaretskaya N, Fischl B. Analysis strategies for high-resolution UHF-fMRI data. Neuroimage 2018; 168:296-320. [PMID: 28461062 PMCID: PMC5664177 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.04.053] [Citation(s) in RCA: 64] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/14/2016] [Revised: 04/21/2017] [Accepted: 04/22/2017] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
Functional MRI (fMRI) benefits from both increased sensitivity and specificity with increasing magnetic field strength, making it a key application for Ultra-High Field (UHF) MRI scanners. Most UHF-fMRI studies utilize the dramatic increases in sensitivity and specificity to acquire high-resolution data reaching sub-millimeter scales, which enable new classes of experiments to probe the functional organization of the human brain. This review article surveys advanced data analysis strategies developed for high-resolution fMRI at UHF. These include strategies designed to mitigate distortion and artifacts associated with higher fields in ways that attempt to preserve spatial resolution of the fMRI data, as well as recently introduced analysis techniques that are enabled by these extremely high-resolution data. Particular focus is placed on anatomically-informed analyses, including cortical surface-based analysis, which are powerful techniques that can guide each step of the analysis from preprocessing to statistical analysis to interpretation and visualization. New intracortical analysis techniques for laminar and columnar fMRI are also reviewed and discussed. Prospects for single-subject individualized analyses are also presented and discussed. Altogether, there are both specific challenges and opportunities presented by UHF-fMRI, and the use of proper analysis strategies can help these valuable data reach their full potential.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jonathan R Polimeni
- Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, United States; Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, United States.
| | - Ville Renvall
- Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, United States; Department of Neuroscience and Biomedical Engineering, Aalto University School of Science, Espoo, Finland
| | - Natalia Zaretskaya
- Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Bruce Fischl
- Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, United States; Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, United States
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Huber L, Ivanov D, Handwerker DA, Marrett S, Guidi M, Uludağ K, Bandettini PA, Poser BA. Techniques for blood volume fMRI with VASO: From low-resolution mapping towards sub-millimeter layer-dependent applications. Neuroimage 2018; 164:131-143. [PMID: 27867088 PMCID: PMC5436958 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.11.039] [Citation(s) in RCA: 67] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/22/2016] [Revised: 10/24/2016] [Accepted: 11/14/2016] [Indexed: 12/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Quantitative cerebral blood volume (CBV) fMRI has the potential to overcome several specific limitations of BOLD fMRI. It provides direct physiological interpretability and promises superior localization specificity in applications of sub-millimeter resolution fMRI applications at ultra-high magnetic fields (7T and higher). Non-invasive CBV fMRI using VASO (vascular space occupancy), however, is inherently limited with respect to its data acquisition efficiency, restricting its imaging coverage and achievable spatial and temporal resolution. This limitation may be reduced with recent advanced acceleration and reconstruction strategies that allow two-dimensional acceleration, such as in simultaneous multi-slice (SMS) 2D-EPI or 3D-EPI in combination with CAIPIRINHA field-of-view shifting. In this study, we sought to determine the functional sensitivity and specificity of these readout strategies with VASO over a broad range of spatial resolutions; spanning from low spatial resolution (3mm) whole-cortex to sub-millimeter (0.75mm) slab-of-cortex (for cortical layer-dependent applications). In the thermal-noise-dominated regime of sub-millimeter resolutions, 3D-EPI-VASO provides higher temporal stability and sensitivity to detect changes in CBV compared to 2D-EPI-VASO. In this regime, 3D-EPI-VASO unveils task activation located in the cortical laminae with little contamination from surface veins, in contrast to the cortical surface weighting of GE-BOLD fMRI. In the physiological-noise-dominated regime of lower resolutions, however, 2D-SMS-VASO shows superior performance compared to 3D-EPI-VASO. Due to its superior sensitivity at a layer-dependent level, 3D-EPI VASO promises to play an important role in future neuroscientific applications of layer-dependent fMRI.
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Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Huber
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA.
| | - Dimo Ivanov
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre, Faculty of Psychology and Neurosciencve, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Daniel A Handwerker
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | | | - Maria Guidi
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Kâmil Uludağ
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre, Faculty of Psychology and Neurosciencve, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Peter A Bandettini
- Section on Functional Imaging Methods, Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA; FMRIF, NIMH, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA
| | - Benedikt A Poser
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre, Faculty of Psychology and Neurosciencve, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
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28
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Hua J, Brandt AS, Lee S, Blair NIS, Wu Y, Lui S, Patel J, Faria AV, Lim IAL, Unschuld PG, Pekar JJ, van Zijl PCM, Ross CA, Margolis RL. Abnormal Grey Matter Arteriolar Cerebral Blood Volume in Schizophrenia Measured With 3D Inflow-Based Vascular-Space-Occupancy MRI at 7T. Schizophr Bull 2017; 43:620-632. [PMID: 27539951 PMCID: PMC5464028 DOI: 10.1093/schbul/sbw109] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/05/2023]
Abstract
Metabolic dysfunction and microvascular abnormality may contribute to the pathogenesis of schizophrenia. Most previous studies of cerebral perfusion in schizophrenia measured total cerebral blood volume (CBV) and cerebral blood flow (CBF) in the brain, which reflect the ensemble signal from the arteriolar, capillary, and venular compartments of the microvasculature. As the arterioles are the most actively regulated blood vessels among these compartments, they may be the most sensitive component of the microvasculature to metabolic disturbances. In this study, we adopted the inflow-based vascular-space-occupancy (iVASO) MRI approach to investigate alterations in the volume of small arterial (pial) and arteriolar vessels (arteriolar cerebral blood volume [CBVa]) in the brain of schizophrenia patients. The iVASO approach was extended to 3-dimensional (3D) whole brain coverage, and CBVa was measured in the brains of 12 schizophrenia patients and 12 matched controls at ultra-high magnetic field (7T). Significant reduction in grey matter (GM) CBVa was found in multiple areas across the whole brain in patients (relative changes of 14%-51% and effect sizes of 0.7-2.3). GM CBVa values in several regions in the temporal cortex showed significant negative correlations with disease duration in patients. GM CBVa increase was also found in a few brain regions. Our results imply that microvascular abnormality may play a role in schizophrenia, and suggest GM CBVa as a potential marker for the disease. Further investigation is needed to elucidate whether such effects are due to primary vascular impairment or secondary to other causes, such as metabolic dysfunction.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jun Hua
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
| | - Allison S. Brandt
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
| | - SeungWook Lee
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
| | | | - Yuankui Wu
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD;,Department of Medical Imaging, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Su Lui
- Department of Radiology, Huaxi MR Research Center (HMRRC), West China Hospital of Sichuan University, Chengdu, China;,Department of Radiology, the Second Affiliated Hospital, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China
| | - Jaymin Patel
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
| | - Andreia V. Faria
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
| | - Issel Anne L. Lim
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
| | - Paul G. Unschuld
- Division of Psychiatry Research and Psychogeriatric Medicine, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland
| | - James J. Pekar
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
| | - Peter C. M. van Zijl
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD
| | - Christopher A. Ross
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,Department of Neurology and Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,Departments of Neuroscience and Pharmacology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
| | - Russell L. Margolis
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;,Department of Neurology and Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD
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29
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A three-dimensional single-scan approach for the measurement of changes in cerebral blood volume, blood flow, and blood oxygenation-weighted signals during functional stimulation. Neuroimage 2017; 147:976-984. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.12.082] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/25/2016] [Revised: 11/10/2016] [Accepted: 12/28/2016] [Indexed: 11/23/2022] Open
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30
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Wu Y, Agarwal S, Jones CK, Webb AG, van Zijl PCM, Hua J, Pillai JJ. Measurement of arteriolar blood volume in brain tumors using MRI without exogenous contrast agent administration at 7T. J Magn Reson Imaging 2016; 44:1244-1255. [PMID: 27028493 PMCID: PMC5045323 DOI: 10.1002/jmri.25248] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/07/2015] [Accepted: 03/04/2016] [Indexed: 11/11/2022] Open
Abstract
PURPOSE Arteriolar cerebral-blood-volume (CBVa) is an important perfusion parameter that can be measured using inflow-based vascular-space-occupancy (iVASO) MRI without exogenous contrast agent administration. The purpose of this study is to assess the potential diagnostic value of CBVa in brain tumor patients by comparing it with total-CBV (including arterial, capillary and venous vessels) measured by dynamic-susceptibility-contrast (DSC) MRI. MATERIALS AND METHODS Twelve brain tumor patients were scanned using iVASO (on 7T as part of a research project) and DSC (on 3T as part of routine clinical protocols) MRI. Region-of-interest analysis was performed to compare the resulting perfusion measures between tumoral and contralateral regions, and to evaluate their associations with tumor grades. RESULTS CBVa measured by iVASO MRI significantly correlated with WHO grade (ρ = 0.37, P = 0.04). Total-CBV measured by DSC MRI showed a trend of correlation with WHO grade (ρ = 0.28, P = 0.5). The signal-to-noise ratio was comparable (P > 0.1) between the two methods, while the contrast-to-noise ratio between tumoral and contralateral regions was higher in iVASO-CBVa than DSC-CBV in WHO II/III patients (P < 0.05) but comparable in WHO IV patients (P > 0.1). A trend of positive correlation between DSC-CBV and iVASO-CBVa was observed (R2 = 0.28, P = 0.07). CONCLUSION In this initial patient study, CBVa demonstrated a stronger correlation with WHO grade than total-CBV. Further investigation with a larger cohort is warranted to validate whether CBVa can be a better classifier than total-CBV for the stratification of brain tumors, and whether iVASO MRI can be a useful alternative method for the assessment of tumor perfusion, especially when exogenous contrast agent administration is difficult in certain patient populations. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2016;44:1244-1255.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuankui Wu
- Department of Medical Imaging, Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, P.R. China
- Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
| | - Shruti Agarwal
- Division of Neuroradiology, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
| | - Craig K Jones
- Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
| | - Andrew G Webb
- Department of Radiology, C.J. Gorter Center for High Field MRI, Leiden, University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands
| | - Peter C M van Zijl
- Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
| | - Jun Hua
- Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
| | - Jay J Pillai
- Division of Neuroradiology, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.
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31
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Guidi M, Huber L, Lampe L, Gauthier CJ, Möller HE. Lamina-dependent calibrated BOLD response in human primary motor cortex. Neuroimage 2016; 141:250-261. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.06.030] [Citation(s) in RCA: 53] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/05/2016] [Revised: 06/07/2016] [Accepted: 06/17/2016] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
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32
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Donahue MJ, Juttukonda MR, Watchmaker JM. Noise concerns and post-processing procedures in cerebral blood flow (CBF) and cerebral blood volume (CBV) functional magnetic resonance imaging. Neuroimage 2016; 154:43-58. [PMID: 27622397 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.09.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/31/2016] [Revised: 08/22/2016] [Accepted: 09/03/2016] [Indexed: 01/19/2023] Open
Abstract
Functional neuroimaging with blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) contrast has emerged as the most popular method for evaluating qualitative changes in brain function in humans. At typical human field strengths (1.5-3.0T), BOLD contrast provides a measure of changes in transverse water relaxation rates in and around capillary and venous blood, and as such provides only a surrogate marker of brain function that depends on dynamic changes in hemodynamics (e.g., cerebral blood flow and volume) and metabolism (e.g., oxygen extraction fraction and the cerebral metabolic rate of oxygen consumption). Alternative functional neuroimaging methods that are specifically sensitive to these constituents of the BOLD signal are being developed and applied in a growing number of clinical and neuroscience applications of quantitative cerebral physiology. These methods require additional considerations for interpreting and quantifying their contrast responsibly. Here, an overview of two popular methods, arterial spin labeling and vascular space occupancy, is presented specifically in the context of functional neuroimaging. Appropriate post-processing and experimental acquisition strategies are summarized with the motivation of reducing sensitivity to noise and unintended signal sources and improving quantitative accuracy of cerebral hemodynamics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Manus J Donahue
- Radiology and Radiological Sciences, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, USA; Neurology, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, USA; Psychiatry, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, USA.
| | - Meher R Juttukonda
- Radiology and Radiological Sciences, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, USA
| | - Jennifer M Watchmaker
- Radiology and Radiological Sciences, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, USA
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Huber L, Ivanov D, Guidi M, Turner R, Uludağ K, Möller HE, Poser BA. Functional cerebral blood volume mapping with simultaneous multi-slice acquisition. Neuroimage 2016; 125:1159-1168. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2015.10.082] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/06/2015] [Revised: 09/08/2015] [Accepted: 10/27/2015] [Indexed: 01/22/2023] Open
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Huber L, Goense J, Kennerley AJ, Trampel R, Guidi M, Reimer E, Ivanov D, Neef N, Gauthier CJ, Turner R, Möller HE. Cortical lamina-dependent blood volume changes in human brain at 7 T. Neuroimage 2015; 107:23-33. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2014.11.046] [Citation(s) in RCA: 97] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/20/2014] [Revised: 11/07/2014] [Accepted: 11/10/2014] [Indexed: 12/15/2022] Open
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Cheng Y, van Zijl PCM, Hua J. Measurement of parenchymal extravascular R2* and tissue oxygen extraction fraction using multi-echo vascular space occupancy MRI at 7 T. NMR IN BIOMEDICINE 2015; 28:264-271. [PMID: 25521948 PMCID: PMC4297270 DOI: 10.1002/nbm.3250] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/02/2014] [Revised: 11/19/2014] [Accepted: 11/26/2014] [Indexed: 06/04/2023]
Abstract
Parenchymal extravascular R2* is an important parameter for quantitative blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) studies. Total and intravascular R2* values and changes in R2* values during functional stimulations have been reported in a number of studies. The purpose of this study was to measure absolute extravascular R2* values in human visual cortex and to estimate the intra- and extravascular contributions to the BOLD effect at 7 T. Vascular space occupancy (VASO) MRI was employed to separate out the extravascular tissue signal. Multi-echo VASO and BOLD functional MRI (fMRI) with visual stimulation were performed at 7 T for R2* measurement at a spatial resolution of 2.5 × 2.5 × 2.5 mm(3) in healthy volunteers (n = 6). The ratio of changes in extravascular and total R2* (ΔR2*) was used to estimate the extravascular fraction of the BOLD effect. Extravascular R2* values were found to be 44.66 ± 1.55 and 43.38 ± 1.51 s(-1) (mean ± standard error of the mean, n = 6) at rest and activation, respectively, in human visual cortex at 7 T. The extravascular BOLD fraction was estimated to be 91 ± 3%. The parenchymal oxygen extraction fraction (OEF) during activation was estimated to be 0.24 ± 0.01 based on the R2* measurements, indicating an approximately 37% decrease compared with OEF at rest.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ying Cheng
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD USA
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD USA
| | - Peter C. M. van Zijl
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD USA
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD USA
| | - Jun Hua
- F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD USA
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD USA
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Cheng Y, van Zijl PCM, Pekar JJ, Hua J. Three-dimensional acquisition of cerebral blood volume and flow responses during functional stimulation in a single scan. Neuroimage 2014; 103:533-541. [PMID: 25152092 PMCID: PMC4252776 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2014.08.025] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/29/2014] [Accepted: 08/14/2014] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
In addition to the BOLD scan, quantitative functional MRI studies require measurement of both cerebral blood volume (CBV) and flow (CBF) dynamics. The ability to detect CBV and CBF responses in a single additional scan would shorten the total scan time and reduce temporal variations. Several approaches for simultaneous CBV and CBF measurement during functional MRI experiments have been proposed in two-dimensional (2D) mode covering one to three slices in one repetition time (TR). Here, we extended the principles from previous work and present a three-dimensional (3D) whole-brain MRI approach that combines the vascular-space-occupancy (VASO) and flow-sensitive alternating inversion recovery (FAIR) arterial spin labeling (ASL) techniques, allowing the measurement of CBV and CBF dynamics, respectively, in a single scan. 3D acquisitions are complicated for such a scan combination as the time to null blood signal during a steady state needs to be known. We estimated this using Bloch simulations and demonstrate that the resulting 3D acquisition can detect activation patterns and relative signal changes of quality comparable to that of the original separate scans. The same was found for temporal signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR). This approach provides improved acquisition efficiency when both CBV and CBF responses need to be monitored during a functional task.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ying Cheng
- F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Peter C M van Zijl
- F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA; Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - James J Pekar
- F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA; Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA
| | - Jun Hua
- F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA; Division of MR Research, Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
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Krieger SN, Huber L, Poser BA, Turner R, Egan GF. Simultaneous acquisition of cerebral blood volume-, blood flow-, and blood oxygenation-weighted MRI signals at ultra-high magnetic field. Magn Reson Med 2014; 74:513-7. [DOI: 10.1002/mrm.25431] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/05/2014] [Revised: 08/05/2014] [Accepted: 08/07/2014] [Indexed: 11/05/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Steffen N. Krieger
- Max Plank Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
- Monash Biomedical Imaging, Monash University; Melbourne Australia
| | - Laurentius Huber
- Max Plank Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Benedikt A. Poser
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre, Maastricht University; Maastricht The Netherlands
| | - Robert Turner
- Max Plank Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Gary F. Egan
- Monash Biomedical Imaging, Monash University; Melbourne Australia
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Huber L, Goense J, Kennerley AJ, Ivanov D, Krieger SN, Lepsien J, Trampel R, Turner R, Möller HE. Investigation of the neurovascular coupling in positive and negative BOLD responses in human brain at 7 T. Neuroimage 2014; 97:349-62. [PMID: 24742920 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2014.04.022] [Citation(s) in RCA: 67] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/31/2013] [Revised: 04/02/2014] [Accepted: 04/07/2014] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Decreases in stimulus-dependent blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal and their underlying neurovascular origins have recently gained considerable interest. In this study a multi-echo, BOLD-corrected vascular space occupancy (VASO) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technique was used to investigate neurovascular responses during stimuli that elicit positive and negative BOLD responses in human brain at 7 T. Stimulus-induced BOLD, cerebral blood volume (CBV), and cerebral blood flow (CBF) changes were measured and analyzed in 'arterial' and 'venous' blood compartments in macro- and microvasculature. We found that the overall interplay of mean CBV, CBF and BOLD responses is similar for tasks inducing positive and negative BOLD responses. Some aspects of the neurovascular coupling however, such as the temporal response, cortical depth dependence, and the weighting between 'arterial' and 'venous' contributions, are significantly different for the different task conditions. Namely, while for excitatory tasks the BOLD response peaks at the cortical surface, and the CBV change is similar in cortex and pial vasculature, inhibitory tasks are associated with a maximum negative BOLD response in deeper layers, with CBV showing strong constriction of surface arteries and a faster return to baseline. The different interplays of CBV, CBF and BOLD during excitatory and inhibitory responses suggests different underlying hemodynamic mechanisms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Huber
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany.
| | - Jozien Goense
- Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany; Institute of Neuroscience and Psychology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK
| | - Aneurin J Kennerley
- Signal Processing in Neuroimaging and Systems Neuroscience, University of Sheffield, UK
| | - Dimo Ivanov
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Steffen N Krieger
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany; Monash Biomedical Imaging, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
| | - Jöran Lepsien
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Robert Trampel
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Robert Turner
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Harald E Möller
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
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Hua J, Qin Q, van Zijl PCM, Pekar JJ, Jones CK. Whole-brain three-dimensional T2-weighted BOLD functional magnetic resonance imaging at 7 Tesla. Magn Reson Med 2013; 72:1530-40. [PMID: 24338901 DOI: 10.1002/mrm.25055] [Citation(s) in RCA: 35] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/27/2013] [Revised: 10/30/2013] [Accepted: 10/31/2013] [Indexed: 11/05/2022]
Abstract
PURPOSE A new acquisition scheme for T2-weighted spin-echo BOLD fMRI is introduced. METHODS It uses a T2-preparation module to induce blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) contrast, followed by a single-shot three-dimensional (3D) fast gradient-echo readout with short echo time (TE). It differs from most spin-echo BOLD sequences in that BOLD contrast is generated before the readout, which eliminates the "dead time" due to long TE required for T2 contrast, and substantially improves acquisition efficiency. This approach, termed "3D T2prep-GRE," was implemented at 7 Tesla (T) with a typical spatial (2.5 × 2.5 × 2.5 mm(3) ) and temporal (TR = 2.3 s) resolution for functional MRI (fMRI) and whole-brain coverage (55 slices), and compared with the widely used 2D spin-echo EPI sequence. RESULTS In fMRI experiments of simultaneous visual/motor activities, 3D T2prep-GRE showed minimal distortion and little signal dropout across the whole brain. Its lower power deposition allowed greater spatial coverage (55 versus 17 slices with identical TR, resolution and power level), temporal SNR (60% higher) and CNR (35% higher) efficiency than 2D spin-echo EPI. It also showed smaller T2* contamination. CONCLUSION This approach is expected to be useful for ultra-high field fMRI, especially for regions near air cavities. The concept of using T2-preparation to generate BOLD contrast can be combined with many other sequences at any field strength.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jun Hua
- The Russell H. Morgan Department of Radiology and Radiological Science, Division of MR Research, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA; F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
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Detecting resting-state brain activity by spontaneous cerebral blood volume fluctuations using whole brain vascular space occupancy imaging. Neuroimage 2013; 84:575-84. [PMID: 24055705 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.09.019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/06/2013] [Revised: 08/30/2013] [Accepted: 09/12/2013] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Resting-state brain activity has been investigated extensively using BOLD contrast. However, BOLD signal represents the combined effects of multiple physiological processes and its spatial localization is less accurate than that of cerebral blood flow and volume (CBF and CBF, respectively). In this study, we demonstrate that resting-state brain activity can be reliably detected by spontaneous fluctuations of CBV-weighted signal using whole-brain gradient and spin echo (GRASE) based vascular space occupancy (VASO) imaging. Specifically, using independent component analysis, intrinsic brain networks, including default mode, salience, executive control, visual, auditory, and sensorimotor networks were revealed robustly by the VASO technique. We further demonstrate that task-evoked VASO signal aligned well with expected gray matter areas, while blood-oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal extended outside of these areas probably due to their different spatial specificity. The improved spatial localization of VASO is consistent with previous studies using animal models. Moreover, we showed that the 3D-GRASE VASO images had reduced susceptibility-induced signal voiding, compared to the BOLD technique. This is attributed to the fact that VASO does not require T2* weighting, thus the acquisition can use a shorter TE and can employ spin-echo scheme. Consequently VASO-based functional connectivity signals were well preserved in brain regions that tend to suffer from signal loss and geometric distortion in BOLD, such as orbital prefrontal cortex. Our study suggests that 3D-GRASE VASO imaging, with its improved spatial specificity and less sensitivity to susceptibility artifacts, may have advantages in resting-state fMRI studies.
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Huber L, Ivanov D, Krieger SN, Streicher MN, Mildner T, Poser BA, Möller HE, Turner R. Slab-selective, BOLD-corrected VASO at 7 Tesla provides measures of cerebral blood volume reactivity with high signal-to-noise ratio. Magn Reson Med 2013; 72:137-48. [DOI: 10.1002/mrm.24916] [Citation(s) in RCA: 86] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/06/2013] [Revised: 07/04/2013] [Accepted: 07/16/2013] [Indexed: 12/12/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Laurentius Huber
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Dimo Ivanov
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre; Maastricht University; Maastricht The Netherlands
| | - Steffen N. Krieger
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
- Monash Biomedical Imaging; Monash University; Melbourne Victoria Australia
| | - Markus N. Streicher
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Toralf Mildner
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Benedikt A. Poser
- Maastricht Brain Imaging Centre; Maastricht University; Maastricht The Netherlands
- Department of Medicine; John A. Burns School of Medicine; University of Hawaii; Honolulu Hawaii USA
- Donders Institute; Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging; Radboud University Nijmegen; Nijmegen The Netherlands
| | - Harald E. Möller
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
| | - Robert Turner
- Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences; Leipzig Germany
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Lu H, Hua J, van Zijl PCM. Noninvasive functional imaging of cerebral blood volume with vascular-space-occupancy (VASO) MRI. NMR IN BIOMEDICINE 2013; 26:932-948. [PMID: 23355392 PMCID: PMC3659207 DOI: 10.1002/nbm.2905] [Citation(s) in RCA: 46] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/03/2012] [Revised: 10/29/2012] [Accepted: 11/18/2012] [Indexed: 06/01/2023]
Abstract
Functional MRI (fMRI) based on changes in cerebral blood volume (CBV) can probe directly vasodilatation and vasoconstriction during brain activation or physiologic challenges, and can provide important insights into the mechanism of blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) signal changes. At present, the most widely used CBV fMRI technique in humans is called vascular-space-occupancy (VASO) MRI, and this article provides a technical review of this method. VASO MRI utilizes T1 differences between blood and tissue to distinguish between these two compartments within a voxel, and employs a blood-nulling inversion recovery sequence to yield an MR signal proportional to 1 - CBV. As such, vasodilatation will result in a VASO signal decrease and vasoconstriction will have the reverse effect. The VASO technique can be performed dynamically with a temporal resolution comparable with several other fMRI methods, such as BOLD or arterial spin labeling (ASL), and is particularly powerful when conducted in conjunction with these complementary techniques. The pulse sequence and imaging parameters of VASO can be optimized such that the signal change is predominantly of CBV origin, but careful considerations should be taken to minimize other contributions, such as those from the BOLD effect, cerebral blood flow (CBF) and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). The sensitivity of the VASO technique is the primary disadvantage when compared with BOLD, but this technique is increasingly demonstrating its utility in neuroscientific and clinical applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hanzhang Lu
- Advanced Imaging Research Center, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA.
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