Functional magnetic resonance imaging or functional MRI (fMRI) measures brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow. This technique relies on the fact that cerebral blood flow and neuronal activation are coupled. When an area of the brain is in use, blood flow to that region also increases.
Cardiff University is a public research university in Cardiff, Wales. It was established in 1883 as the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire and became a founding college of the University of Wales in 1893. It was renamed University College, Cardiff in 1972 and merged with the University of Wales Institute of Science and Technology in 1988 to become University of Wales College, Cardiff and then University of Wales, Cardiff in 1996. In 1997 it received degree-awarding powers, but held them in abeyance. It adopted the operating name of Cardiff University in 1999; this became its legal name in 2005, when it became an independent university awarding its own degrees.
Statistical parametric mapping (SPM) is a statistical technique for examining differences in brain activity recorded during functional neuroimaging experiments. It was created by Karl Friston. It may alternatively refer to software created by the Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience at University College London to carry out such analyses.
Neuroimaging is a medical technique that allows doctors and researchers to take pictures of the inner workings of the body or brain of a patient. It can show areas with heightened activity, areas with high or low blood flow, the structure of the patients brain/body, as well as certain abnormalities. Neuroimaging is most often used to find the specific location of certain diseases or birth defects such as tumors, cancers, or clogged arteries. Neuroimaging first came about as a medical technique in the 1880's with the invention of the human circulation balance and has since lead to other inventions such as the x-ray, air ventriculography, cerebral angiography, PET/SPECT scans, magnetoencephalography, and xenon CT scanning.
Cardiff Metropolitan University, formerly University of Wales Institute, Cardiff and commonly referred to as Cardiff Met, is a university located in the city of Cardiff.
Neuroimaging is the use of quantitative (computational) techniques to study the structure and function of the central nervous system, developed as an objective way of scientifically studying the healthy human brain in a non-invasive manner. Increasingly it is also being used for quantitative research studies of brain disease and psychiatric illness. Neuroimaging is highly multidisciplinary involving neuroscience, computer science, psychology and statistics, and is not a medical specialty. Neuroimaging is sometimes confused with neuroradiology.
The Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit is a branch of the UK Medical Research Council, based in Cambridge, England. The CBSU is a centre for cognitive neuroscience, with a mission to improve human health by understanding and enhancing cognition and behaviour in health, disease and disorder. It is one of the largest and most long-lasting contributors to the development of psychological theory and practice.
FreeSurfer is a brain imaging software package originally developed by Bruce Fischl, Anders Dale, Martin Sereno, and Doug Greve. Development and maintenance of FreeSurfer is now the primary responsibility of the Laboratory for Computational Neuroimaging at the Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging. FreeSurfer contains a set of programs with a common focus of analyzing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of brain tissue. It is an important tool in functional brain mapping and contains tools to conduct both volume based and surface based analysis. FreeSurfer includes tools for the reconstruction of topologically correct and geometrically accurate models of both the gray/white and pial surfaces, for measuring cortical thickness, surface area and folding, and for computing inter-subject registration based on the pattern of cortical folds.
The University of Manchester Wolfson Molecular Imaging Centre (WMIC) is a purpose-built molecular imaging research facility. Based on the site of the Christie Hospital in Manchester, the Centre aims to develop clinical research and development in medical imaging in areas of oncology, neuroscience and psychiatry research.
The Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging at University College London is a world-leading interdisciplinary centre for neuroimaging research based in London, United Kingdom. Researchers at the Centre use expertise to investigate how the human brain generates behaviour, thoughts and feelings and how to use this knowledge to help patients with neurological and psychiatric disorders. Human neuroimaging allows scientists to non-invasively investigate the brain structure and functions including Action, Decision Making, Emotion, Hearing, Language, Memory, Navigation, Seeing, Self awareness, Social Behaviour and the Bayesian Brain
The Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre (WBIC) is a UK Biomedical Imaging Centre, located at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, England, on the Cambridge Bio-Medical Campus at the southwestern end of Hills Road. It is a division of the Department of Clinical Neurosciences of the University of Cambridge.
Connectomics is the production and study of connectomes: comprehensive maps of connections within an organism's nervous system. More generally, it can be thought of as the study of neuronal wiring diagrams with a focus on how structural connectivity, individual synapses, cellular morphology, and cellular ultrastructure contribute to the make up of a network. The nervous system is a network made of billions of connections and these connections are responsible for our thoughts, emotions, actions, memories, function and dysfunction. Therefore, the study of connectomics aims to advance our understanding of mental health and cognition by understanding how cells in the nervous system are connected and communicate. Because these structures are extremely complex, methods within this field use a high-throughput application of functional and structural neural imaging, most commonly magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), electron microscopy, and histological techniques in order to increase the speed, efficiency, and resolution of these nervous system maps. To date, tens of large scale datasets have been collected spanning the nervous system including the various areas of cortex, cerebellum, the retina, the peripheral nervous system and neuromuscular junctions.
The Human Connectome Project (HCP) is a five-year project sponsored by sixteen components of the National Institutes of Health, split between two consortia of research institutions. The project was launched in July 2009 as the first of three Grand Challenges of the NIH's Blueprint for Neuroscience Research. On September 15, 2010, the NIH announced that it would award two grants: $30 million over five years to a consortium led by Washington University in St. Louis and the University of Minnesota, with strong contributions from University of Oxford (FMRIB) and $8.5 million over three years to a consortium led by Harvard University, Massachusetts General Hospital and the University of California Los Angeles.
Positron emission tomography–magnetic resonance imaging (PET–MRI) is a hybrid imaging technology that incorporates magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) soft tissue morphological imaging and positron emission tomography (PET) functional imaging.
Resting state fMRI is a method of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) that is used in brain mapping to evaluate regional interactions that occur in a resting or task-negative state, when an explicit task is not being performed. A number of resting-state brain networks have been identified, one of which is the default mode network. These brain networks are observed through changes in blood flow in the brain which creates what is referred to as a blood-oxygen-level dependent (BOLD) signal that can be measured using fMRI.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to brain mapping:
Irene Mary Carmel Tracey is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford and former Warden of Merton College, Oxford. She is also Professor of Anaesthetic Neuroscience in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences and formerly Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Oxford. She is a co-founder of the Oxford Centre for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain (FMRIB), now the Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging. Her team’s research is focused on the neuroscience of pain, specifically pain perception and analgesia as well as how anaesthetics produce altered states of consciousness. Her team uses multidisciplinary approaches including neuroimaging.
Rebeccah Slater is a British neuroscientist and academic. She is professor of paediatric neuroscience and a senior Wellcome Trust research fellow at the University of Oxford. She is also a professorial fellow in Neuroscience at St John's College.
Damien Fair is a behavioral neuroscientist, professor at the University of Minnesota, and director of the Masonic Institute for the Developing Brain. In 2020, he was selected for the MacArthur Fellows Program. In 2013, he received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.
Karla Loreen Miller is an American neuroscientist and professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Oxford. Her research investigates the development of neuroimaging techniques, with a particular focus on Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), neuroimaging, diffusion MRI and functional magnetic resonance imaging. She was elected a Fellow of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine in 2016.
