Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) of older adults at risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD) by virtue of their cognitive (i.e., mild cognitive impairment [MCI]) and/or genetic (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPrior measures of the blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) and cerebral blood flow (CBF) responses to a memory-encoding task within the medial temporal lobe have suggested that the coupling between functional changes in CBF and changes in the cerebral metabolic rate of oxygen (CMRO(2)) may be tighter in the medial temporal lobe as compared to the primary sensory areas. In this study, we used a calibrated functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) approach to directly estimate memory-encoding-related changes in CMRO(2) and to assess the coupling between CBF and CMRO(2) in the medial temporal lobe. The CBF-CMRO(2) coupling ratio was estimated using a linear fit to the flow and metabolism changes observed across subjects.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFChanges in the cerebrovascular system due to age or disease can significantly alter the blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) signal and complicate its interpretation. The simultaneous acquisition of arterial spin labeling (ASL) and BOLD data represents a useful technique to more fully characterize the neurovascular underpinnings of functional brain response to cognition. We conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging (FMRI) study of episodic memory encoding to investigate whether age is related to cerebral blood flow (CBF) and BOLD response in the medial temporal lobe (MTL).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBlood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies using parallel imaging to reduce the readout window have reported a loss in temporal signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) that is less than would be expected given a purely thermal noise model. In this study, the impact of parallel imaging on the noise components and functional sensitivity of both BOLD and perfusion-based fMRI data was investigated. Dual-echo arterial spin labeling data were acquired on five subjects using sensitivity encoding (SENSE), at reduction factors (R) of 1, 2 and 3.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFunctional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of the medial temporal lobe have primarily made use of the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) response to neural activity. The interpretation of the BOLD signal as a measure of medial temporal lobe function can be complicated, however, by changes in the cerebrovascular system that can occur with both normal aging and age-related diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease. Quantitative measures of the functional cerebral blood flow (CBF) response offer a useful complement to BOLD measures and have been shown to aid in the interpretation of fMRI studies.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA component based method (CompCor) for the reduction of noise in both blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) and perfusion-based functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data is presented. In the proposed method, significant principal components are derived from noise regions-of-interest (ROI) in which the time series data are unlikely to be modulated by neural activity. These components are then included as nuisance parameters within general linear models for BOLD and perfusion-based fMRI time series data.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThree methods for the reduction of physiological noise in arterial spin labeling (ASL) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) are presented and compared. The methods are based upon a general linear model of the ASL measurement process and on a previously described retrospective image-based method (RETROICOR) for physiological noise reduction in blood oxygenation level dependent fMRI. In the first method, the contribution of physiological noise to the interleaved control and tag images that comprise the ASL time series are assumed to be equal, while in the second method this assumption is not made.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) responses to visual stimuli, using both a 1-s long single trial stimulus and a 20-s long block stimulus, were measured in a 4-T magnetic field both before and immediately after a 200-mg caffeine dose. In addition, resting levels of cerebral blood flow (CBF) were measured using arterial spin labeling. For the single trial stimulus, the caffeine dose significantly (p<0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe physiological basis of the blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal and its dependence on baseline cerebral blood flow (CBF) were investigated by comparing responses to a visual stimulus after physiological changes of the baseline. Eight human subjects were imaged with 3 and 4 T MRI scanners, and both BOLD signal and CBF were simultaneously measured. Subjects viewed a flickering radial checkerboard in a block design experiment, alternating between eyes open or closed during the off periods.
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