1. Longitudinal measurement of the developing thalamus in the preterm brain using multi-modal MRI.
- Author
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Eaton-Rosen Z, Melbourne A, Orasanu E, Modat M, Cardoso MJ, Bainbridge A, Kendall GS, Robertson NJ, Marlow N, and Ourselin S
- Subjects
- Female, Gray Matter pathology, Humans, Infant, Premature, Longitudinal Studies, Male, Reproducibility of Results, Sensitivity and Specificity, Aging pathology, Brain pathology, Diffusion Tensor Imaging methods, Multimodal Imaging methods, Nerve Fibers, Myelinated pathology, Pattern Recognition, Automated methods, Thalamus pathology
- Abstract
Preterm birth is a significant public health concern. For infants born very preterm (≤ 32 weeks completed gestation), there is a high instance of developmental disability. Due to the heterogeneity of patient outcomes, it is important to investigate early markers of future ability to provide effective and targeted intervention. As a neuronal relay centre, the thalamus is critical for effective cognitive function and, thus, development of white matter connections between the thalamus and cortex is vital. By non-invasively examining the state of the thalamus we can monitor development in the preterm period. To track the development we develop a novel registration technique to combine data from multiple modalities, in order to derive the transformation from a preterm scan, to a scan of the same infant at term-equivalent age. By measuring the changes in diffusion parameters over this period on a per-voxel basis, we hope to provide unique insight into neurodevelopment.
- Published
- 2014
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