Chen Y, Pais-Roldan P, Chen X, Frosz MH, Yu X. MRI-guided robotic arm drives optogenetic fMRI with concurrent Ca
2+ recording.
Nat Commun 2019;
10:2536. [PMID:
31182714 PMCID:
PMC6557837 DOI:
10.1038/s41467-019-10450-3]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/11/2018] [Accepted: 05/11/2019] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Optical fiber-mediated optogenetic activation and neuronal Ca2+ recording in combination with fMRI provide a multi-modal fMRI platform. Here, we developed an MRI-guided robotic arm (MgRA) as a flexible positioning system with high precision to real-time assist optical fiber brain intervention for multi-modal animal fMRI. Besides the ex vivo precision evaluation, we present the highly reliable brain activity patterns in the projected basal forebrain regions upon MgRA-driven optogenetic stimulation in the lateral hypothalamus. Also, we show the step-wise optical fiber targeting thalamic nuclei and map the region-specific functional connectivity with whole-brain fMRI accompanied by simultaneous calcium recordings to specify its circuit-specificity. The MgRA also guides the real-time microinjection to specific deep brain nuclei, which is demonstrated by an Mn-enhanced MRI method. The MgRA represents a clear advantage over the standard stereotaxic-based fiber implantation and opens a broad avenue to investigate the circuit-specific functional brain mapping with the multi-modal fMRI platform.
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